How to smoke carp

Wash and clean the fish, remove the innards with a spoon scrape off the dark strip along the inside of the spinal bones, the blunt side of a knife, remove the film from the inside. Have the fish fillets, removing all bones, skin leave.

Prepare the brine by mixing 1.5 cups of table salt with 3,5 litres of water (water should totally cover the meat), add some brown sugar to give the dish a sweet taste. Place the fillets in a deep bowl and cover with brine. Cover the bowl with a towel and leave in the refrigerator or in a cool place overnight. Remove the fillets from the brine, rinse well with fresh water, dry it with a napkin and leave to dry for half an hour.

Prepare the smoker: take the stainless steel bucket, set inside the lattice, one at a height of 1/3 of the bucket, the other 2/3 of the bucket, pick up or fabricate a dense cover to the bucket. Prepare a fire pit and a stand to set the smoker on it.

Soak for 1 hour sawdust or wood chips of deciduous trees. For use in the smokehouse fit cherry wood, Apple, juniper, hazel, beech, oak, alder, maple, Linden, ash, elm, willow, poplar, aspen, or birch (bark of trees must not fall into the sawdust). Sprinkle the sawdust with a layer of 1.5–2 cm to the bottom of the smokehouse, put the fillet on the grate, set them inside, close the lid, set the smokehouse on fire. Smoking lasts for at least 40 minutes, the fish is considered safe for human consumption, if the inside temperature of the carcass was kept at 80oC at least an hour, the temperature in the smokehouse is about 105-120C.

The fish is ready, remove from the smoker, let cool, wrap in paraffin paper and store in the refrigerator no more than two weeks, serve chilled on the second or third day after cooking. Freeze smoked fish, if you want to store it more than two weeks.