How to prepare duck for smoking. Poultry smoking technology

Meat has been smoked since ancient times, since then there was no other way to prepare it for future use. Our ancestors accidentally discovered that exposure to wood smoke and air allows meat to be stored for a long time, while its taste improves and becomes piquant.

Smoked poultry, distinguished by its specific taste and aroma, has always been considered an exquisite delicacy. It is served as an independent snack or used to prepare various dishes - hodgepodge, salads, fillings for pancakes and pies.

There is nothing tastier than poultry with smoke, and if you smoke it at home, it will turn out especially tasty and healthy. Shall we try?

Preparing poultry for smoking

Any fresh poultry meat is suitable for classic smoking - well-fed young ducks, geese and chickens, preferably females, since they have more tender and soft meat. The bird carcass is washed, gutted, cut lengthwise into two parts and salted well. Next, each half of the bird is placed between two wooden cutting boards and hit them vigorously with a hammer so that all the bones and joints crackle. At the same time, the salt penetrates deep into the tissues and brain fluid is released, which enriches the taste of the meat.

The bird carcass is placed in a deep dish or hung for 2–4 days in a draft in a cool room, the temperature of which does not exceed 10 °C. During drying, a fermentation process begins in the meat, destroying muscle fibers, as a result of which it softens and its unique flavor bouquet is formed. At low temperatures, the holding time increases. However, at home it is impossible to follow this technology for smoking poultry, so after cutting the carcass it is better to marinate it in brine. The brine is prepared as follows: add a few chopped garlic cloves, ½ cup salt, a few bay leaves, 1 tbsp to a liter of warm water. l. sugar, 2 tbsp. l. vinegar and a pinch of cinnamon. You can add different ingredients and spices to the brine, for example mustard, cloves, cinnamon, citric acid, juniper berries - there are no hard and fast rules. The more spices, the tastier the meat will be. Some chefs inject brine into the meat in the form of injections - in small portions for every 5 cm of the carcass, so that it marinates faster.

The bird is marinated for about two days, placed under pressure, and then “ventilated” by hanging the carcasses for several hours, as described above. Meat can also be marinated in another way - rub the bird on all sides with salt and spices (cumin, black pepper and dill) and leave it like that for a day. After marinating, cuts are sometimes made on the carcass and garlic and pieces of bacon are put inside, but this is not suitable for duck and goose, since they are already quite fatty. You can smoke the bird not only whole, but also in separate pieces - it all depends on your tastes.

Smoking poultry: hot and cold

There are two types at home - cold and hot. They differ from each other only in the method of heat treatment - with cold smoking, the temperature in the smokehouse does not exceed 30 ° C, and the meat is smoked for several days. Hot smoking lasts for several hours at high temperatures - from approximately 80 to 130 ° C, therefore, at the same time as smoking, the meat is baked, resulting in less juicy and more dense.

Cold processing increases the shelf life of meat - it can be stored for a long time even outside the refrigerator, and its taste is much more interesting than after hot smoking. However, if you are going to cold smoke poultry at home, you should salt it well and keep it in the marinade for as long as possible to destroy all microorganisms. Processing meat at a temperature of 70–80 °C is considered semi-hot, but in taste and shelf life it is more like a hot smoked product.

After the bird is placed in the smokehouse, the temperature is set to the maximum level so that a film forms on the surface of the meat, and then the temperature is gradually lowered. Smoked poultry is considered ready when the film is easily separated from the flesh, while goose and duck take longer to smoke because they are fattier, and all the fat must evaporate during cooking. Some chefs periodically dip the meat in brine during smoking to make it more juicy and tasty.

It is necessary to ensure that the meat does not burn during smoking at high temperatures, so sometimes it is wrapped in foil. And another very important point - at the bottom of the smokehouse there must be a special tray where the fat from the meat will drain, because if it drips onto the coals, the bird will begin to taste bitter and acquire a not very pleasant aroma that cannot be eliminated.

What's better to smoke in?

Smokehouses with humidity and temperature control are now sold, and if you bought such a unit, you are very lucky. Many people make smokehouses with their own hands using a standard design - a firebox, a metal container, firewood or sawdust, a tray for fat, a grate for meat and the obligatory lid. You can use any kind of firewood, although experts say that birch gives the meat a tar taste. If you add juniper branches with berries and cherry leaves to the firebox, an incomparable aroma of meat is guaranteed!

Of course, it is better to do home smoking in a country house or on the site of a country house, and not in a city apartment. If you don’t have a summer house with a smokehouse, this does not mean that you will never be able to smoke meat with your own hands. Many housewives have gotten used to doing this in a regular cauldron - to do this, they put alder chips soaked in cold water on the bottom of the cauldron, put a fat tray on top made of several layers of foil, cover it with a grate, the role of which is successfully played by an aluminum dumpling maker, or a mesh from a steamer. Pieces of meat are placed on the grill, tightly closed with a lid, pressed down with a weight and smoked for about 30 minutes, and if the whole bird is smoked, it will take about 1.5 hours.

In urban conditions, you can only cook hot smoked, but, as they say, something is better than nothing at all. The bird is also smoked in a convection oven, pouring alder chips onto the bottom and placing the meat on the grill. The smoking process lasts about an hour at a temperature of 210 °C.

It is very convenient to smoke in the oven by placing a container with wood shavings on the bottom. A grill with meat is placed on top, and this structure is covered with foil so that the smoke does not escape. To cook, you only need to turn on the lower heat (about 300 °C) and cook for about half an hour, and then leave the meat in the oven for another half an hour while the coals smolder. If you smoke meat at home, do not forget to turn on the hood so that your neighbors do not call the fire department.

Many housewives smoke poultry in a slow cooker and even in a microwave oven, using store-bought smoking brine or liquid smoke. It's tasty, simple and quick, although over real fire the dish turns out more piquant.

Hot smoked poultry recipes at home

Original smoked breast

Wash the turkey breasts (about 1 kg) well, cut them into 2 parts and marinate in a deep bowl. For the marinade, mix 50 g soy sauce, 70 ml olive oil, 3 tbsp. l. balsamic vinegar, 1 tsp. ground ginger, salt and black pepper to taste. Keep the meat in this mixture for at least 3 hours, then dry it with a towel and fry in a hot frying pan for 2 minutes on each side until golden brown.

Cover the bottom of the pan with two layers of foil and place the smoking mixture on it - 100 g rice, 30 g black tea, 2 tbsp. l. sugar and 1 tsp. cinnamon. Place a rack on top, place the turkey on it and place the pan over high heat. Keep the breasts in this position for about 10 minutes, and then close the pan with a lid and smoke for about 45 minutes. The turkey turns out amazingly aromatic and delicious!

Smoked duck in a pressure cooker

Home-smoked duck is an exquisite delicacy worthy of a festive table, and you can even cook it in a pressure cooker. To do this, cut the duck into 8 pieces and soak it for 2 hours in a saline solution of 2 liters of water and 2 tbsp. l. salt. Place sawdust on the bottom of the steamer and place a wire rack on which to place a pan for dripping fat. Place two levels of racks with pieces of duck on top; instead of a rack, you can take a “daisy-shaped” steamer. Close the pressure cooker tightly and place it on the heat for half an hour. When it cools down, open the lid - incredibly tasty smoked duck with the aroma of fire and smoke is ready!

Smoky chicken in a slow cooker

If you don’t have time, but want to pamper your family with delicious delicacies, cook it in a slow cooker. In this case, you won't have to actually smoke anything, but the smoking effect will be present.

First, prepare a marinating mixture of 3 chopped cloves of garlic, 1 tbsp. l. sugar, 1 tbsp. l. salt and 1 tsp. ground black pepper. Rinse and dry the chicken well, brush it inside and out with the spicy mixture, place it in an ovenproof bag and store it overnight in the refrigerator. In the morning, add 2 tbsp to the bag. l. liquid smoke, making sure that it covers the entire surface of the carcass, tie the bag tightly, smoke the bird in the double boiler mode for an hour, then simmer it for another half hour in the heating mode.

There are many recipes, or rather recommendations for smoking poultry - duck. From completely simple to incredibly sophisticated. More precisely, not so much fancy, but vaguely and complexly described. And at the same time, from these descriptions, complicated, in my opinion, simply from ignorance of the subject, simple things are not clear. For example, the recommendation is to smoke poultry for 10–12 hours with a two-stage temperature change. First, keep it at 50-70 degrees for 5-6 hours, and then..., but it’s still not clear how to smoke it. "Hot" or... In general, as in most “culinary wisdom” sources, these recipes ... “take 100 grams of beef, pepper and salt to taste, and fry yourself a steak” and, of course, it is strictly necessary, a beautiful photograph of a piece of fried meat.
But! Some useful and interesting information was nevertheless collected and... however, judge for yourself whether it is worth taking note of something.
I’ll just repeat, excuse me, I’ll tell you everything in some detail. Precisely because, if suddenly “who needs it”, then not everyone is a powerful specialist in cooking and ... in general, I hope that the details will be useful.
So, let's take the duck.

Where do we get it? I took it from the freezer. The harvest, sorry, is from last year. They are our home. Looking ahead, I’ll note. Even though we..., in general, we harvested them on the seventieth day, as recommended, from hatching, but we still put a lot of fat into the birds. So I don’t recommend using supermarket ducks for smoking. And although there is now on sale the so-called. “Peking” (in the sense of breed) ducks, but... in general they differ little from “non-Piking” ones. So, go to the market and choose ones that have less fat in the carcasses.
I'll tell you in detail how I cut it. The first step is to remove the neck with the collar area.
And cut out the tail too. This is the part that is, so to speak, opposite the neck.
Then we cut the carcass in half. On the keel, so to speak. Or along. This is more familiar to some.
If you noticed, when cutting the duck, I cut off the edges everywhere. Skin with fat.
We cut each half, along the border of the ribs, into the breast and thigh.
There is no need to cut out the wing from the thoracic part and the leg from the femoral part.
But, I repeat, trim the edges. There will be enough fat without them - I guarantee you that.
Actually, here are the main four parts of the carcass that will be used.

I butchered two carcasses. Here's what's in store.
I note that the tails and necks with collar were also left for smoking. Eating them, of course, will be... very fatty, but for cooking, like in soup or hodgepodge, it will be very harmless.

For salting meat, I prepared this mixture. A teaspoon of coarse salt per kilo of duck is just a mixture of herbs. There's thyme, oregano, rosemary. And a mixture of peppers. Paprika, black, white fragrant, a little spicy red. These seasonings and spices, their quantity and set - to taste.

And mix well.

Then sprinkle each piece of duck with this mixture and, dare I say it, massage it slightly. Not by rubbing the pickling mixture hard, but rather by distributing it evenly. But without fanaticism.

Place in a saucepan. Between the layers of meat and on top, it’s a good idea to sprinkle the same salty mixture.

And in the refrigerator. Or a cellar. This is who has what. About twelve o'clock. There is no need for oppression.
And then…. Fill with water. To cover the contents - nothing more.
I added a couple of bay leaves and peppers. Fragrant and black. You can, of course, also add some roots, celery, parsley, but that’s not for everyone.

Bring to a boil. There is no need to remove the foam. The broth is not the main thing here.

After…. However, one remark should still be added.
Sources clearly explain the meaning of this process by saying that it is necessary to boil the subcutaneous fat from bird parts. I agree here. Look at the resulting broth, so to speak. Its saturation is very, very impressive.

Again - the duration of the process. Somewhere they recommend bringing it to a boil and removing the pan from the heat. Somewhere I advise you to cook for about fifteen to half an hour. I let it bubble for about twenty minutes. Still, this is my first experience and how the smoking of meat will go, I don’t know yet.
Remove the pan from the heat and set to cool. I had to put a weight on top to prevent the duck from coming out.

Once it cools down, take the bird pieces out of the pan and... I put them in a colander so that the water drains and the pieces dry a little.

Of course, it would be better to hang it, but..., in general, it somehow didn’t work out.
We charge the smokehouse. A couple of handfuls of apple chips and just a little cherry chips. For fragrance. On top there is a tray that protects sawdust from grease and other secreted juices.

Place the duck skin side down on the grill. So that there is room for the pieces.

Close the lid and the box on the fire. Not very strong, but still a fire. Although, still, closer to well-hot coals.

After about twenty minutes, open the lid for a couple of minutes to ventilate, or rather release steam. There is no need for excess moisture.

And then I kept the smokehouse on low heat for another forty minutes. So... a little more than a candle. He threw up the wood chips.

Then I let the coals... almost go out.
And this is what happened.

The side that was facing down looks quite decent. Didn't burn or darken. But the one that was facing upward clearly makes it clear that there was plenty of wood chips. So the experience of “smoking fish” is applicable here too. My smokehouse only needs an incomplete handful of wood chips and there is nothing to be afraid of or listen to those sources where they say, and everyone says so, that you need to pour a layer of wood chips... up to a centimeter thick. Hence the excess of smoke, which gave this picture.
Let's try!

Hmmm... Juicy. Those. there was no drought. Already good. The meat cannot be called fatty, although there is quite a lot of subcutaneous fat left. And, if without vodka, then it will still be difficult for the body to process it. Although, if, as I already said, you cook soup or make hodgepodge with duck, then it is quite applicable. But! Dark sediment, especially from the skin, for example, around the neck areas, must be removed. Whatever one may say, it adds a bitterness.
But, in general, the experience was positive. Quite.
An angel to you at your meal!

And a couple of practical comments – conclusions.
1. You need to cook it. But no more than five minutes after boiling. While it cools, the subcutaneous fat will still melt to the same extent as with a longer bubbling of the broth. Longer boiling has no practical benefit.
2. Wood chips. Based on the shown volume of the bookmark and the smokehouse itself. A little more than a third and a little less than half of an ordinary faceted glass. Regardless of the composition, in terms of wood species. Optimally, in my opinion, two thirds would be apple, the rest... I would put cherry and alder in half. Put more... you can see for yourself what happened.
3. Heating temperature and cooking time. No comments here. Everything will work out correctly if, I repeat, there is enough wood chips. The duck will bake and acquire aroma and spirituality.

Alexey Mitrokhin

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The beginning of the hunting season is a long-awaited day for all hunting enthusiasts. In addition to the process of tracking game, I want to please my family and friends with trophies. Recipes for smoking wild duck will not only allow you to prepare a signature dish for the holiday table, but will also ensure the preservation of the product for a longer time.

Before you start reading, please note: this article is dedicated specifically to the wild duck. We talked about it in.

Any game must first be prepared for the smoking process. First of all, it is necessary to carry out the process of removing feather plucking. To remove the feathers better, you need to scald the bird with boiling water for a couple of seconds, then carefully pluck all the feathers and burn them over a fire to remove the fluff. By the way, you can smoke the bird directly during the hunt, if it lasts several days.

Next, they begin gutting and washing the duck. All the insides are carefully removed so as not to crush the gallbladder. Otherwise, you can spoil the meat: it will become very bitter. The carcasses are gutted and cut along the sternum line. Then they are thoroughly washed both inside and out. Upon completion of all preparatory work, they proceed to marinating.

Pickling process

Marinating hot wild ducks is done using the main ingredients - salt and garlic. The process consists of several stages:

• • The prepared bird is placed back down in a container. If the trophy is rich, then it is laid out in layers. Each layer is sprinkled with salt and finely chopped garlic, with one third of a teaspoon of salt and a couple of cloves of garlic per carcass. Next, the container is closed with a lid without pressure and left for half a day. For large duck carcasses, the amount of ingredients is slightly increased.
  • After the time has passed, the container, along with the seasoning and the bird, is filled with water. It should cover the contents. Place a pot of water on the fire, bring to a boil and cook for no more than 15 minutes. Then, remove the container from the heat and allow it to cool completely without removing the duck. Thanks to this process, subcutaneous fat and the unpleasant odor that comes from it are eliminated.

• The broth has cooled down and it’s time to remove the carcasses from it. They are descaled with a clean napkin or the back of a knife. The broth with fat just pours out. The wild duck is ready for the smoking process.

Preparation

You can smoke hot smoked wild duck in either a closed or open smokehouse. Install it somewhere in a quiet place, protected from the wind. The flame in it should pass from the damper in the rear. The entire bottom is filled with dry alder chips. They light a fire under the smokehouse and wait until the bluish smoke appears. As soon as it has formed, they begin to lay in the meat for smoking.

Unfolded carcasses are placed on the grill with their backs up. The game is carefully unwrapped along the cut in the sternum and placed in the smokehouse. Smoking duration is about an hour. All this time you need to constantly maintain the fire. It should not be strong, as it will take over the entire smokehouse. This will cause the temperature to be higher than necessary and the meat will burn.

To check whether the process of hot smoking wild duck at home is proceeding correctly, you need to monitor the color of the smoke. If we see smoke with a blue tint, it means that the temperature is insufficient, the heat is slightly increased. Strong smoke with a pronounced yellowish color is already too much, you need to remove its excess. To do this, simply bleed it through the damper. Excessive smoke leads to a deterioration in the taste of the meat, and it will become bitter.

Throughout the entire smoking process, it is necessary to check the degree of readiness of the product. This can be done by periodically opening the damper and inspecting the duck carcasses:

• A golden color indicates that the bird is ready. Additionally, the carcass needs to be pierced with a sharp stick and the condition of the juice assessed. It should be transparent and free of blood.
• A dark chocolate hue indicates that the meat has been overcooked. As a result, the bird will taste dry and bitter.

You can smoke in a similar way. They are slightly larger than ducks, so their carcasses are cut completely into two parts. You should also increase the smoking time to one and a half hours. It all depends on the size of the goose.

A duck carcass looks rich and appetizing on any holiday table. Many people cannot imagine their feast without enjoying duck meat. Gourmets have many different ways to prepare it. The duck is boiled, fried, baked and even smoked. We will consider the last of the listed cooking options right now. Perhaps not many people know how to smoke duck at home. Today we are correcting this oversight.

For those who didn’t know (didn’t think about this possible method of cooking poultry), and for those who knew but forgot, here are several ways to smoke duck meat. Right now from this article you will know how to smoke a duck (and any other bird) using various methods of processing it. Your guests will be amazed by the delicious dish and its appearance. You just need to choose the most successful and preferable recipes for your taste and not be afraid of culinary experiments.

Duck selection

To get a delicious smoked duck, you need to take the choice of the main raw materials seriously. Frozen poultry is a highly undesirable option. However, not everyone is lucky with purchasing a chilled carcass. If you happen to get frozen raw materials, dry the carcass thoroughly after it has thawed. Excess moisture spoils the skin of the smoked product. Before smoking a duck, be sure to inspect the carcass. Meat of questionable freshness should never enter your home. If you smell aromas that are atypical for poultry: mold, mustiness, bitterness, etc. - do not buy such a product!

Poultry pre-treatment

Those cooks who have keen hunters in their families are luckier. Here there will be no problems with catching the main culprit of today’s article - the duck. The duck will be fresh, without any doubt. But these lucky ones will also have a little more work to do in preparing the carcass(s).

Before smoking a duck, it is necessary to carry out preparatory steps with the carcass. Yes, this is not the most pleasant part of the work, but the expected result will cover all your efforts. Below are the manipulations that need to be performed with any bird (duck) carcass, regardless of the smoking method intended for it.

Down with feathers and stumps

If your favorite hunter got you a duck, before smoking the duck, you need to pluck it: remove all the feathers. Then rinse the carcass well. The next step will be to remove small hairs from the skin and stumps (from feathers). Scorch the bird with fire. You can use a gas stove burner for this procedure.

Poultry cutting

Next, the carcass should be gutted. Remove excess fat (when smoking it will melt and interfere with the quality of the duck). The neck and small bones are also removed. The outer part of the wings is also cut off. Cut off the duck's tail as well. Rinse the bird carcass several more times until the water remains completely clear, only in this case you will get a tasty and beautiful smoked duck.

The duck is smoked whole or divided into four parts.

Marinate the meat

Before smoking duck in any way, you need to marinate the raw materials. Only in this case you will get a delicious delicacy. There are at least two options: wet salting and dry salting. Let's consider them in the appropriate sequence.

Wet Ambassador

A simple method that does not require unusual spices. For one kilogram of duck weight you need to take:

• one liter of water;
• one hundred grams of salt;
• ten grams of sugar;
• lemon juice - half a glass;
• various favorite spices: cloves, allspice, bay leaves.

Bring water to a boil in a saucepan. Add salt, sugar and all spices. Boil the brine for two minutes and pour in the lemon juice. The duck is immersed in the completely cooled marinade. 7-8 hours - and the duck is marinated. Care must be taken to ensure that the entire bird carcass is in the brine at this time.

Dry salting

For this marinade, rub the duck on all sides with plenty of salt and ground pepper. You must first mix these ingredients. Don’t be afraid to overdo it with salt - it’s very difficult to oversalt a duck this way. Once you have processed all the birds, place them in an enamel bowl (bucket or pan). When placing duck meat in a bowl, it should also be generously sprinkled with salt. The dishes with the duck should be kept in a cold place for 5-6 days. Once a day, the meat must be “tossed” - turned over, for better salting.

Before smoking, the marinated duck (both the first and second methods) is hung for 5-10 hours to dry.

Hot smoking

The hot smoked duck recipe is more popular. Poultry prepared in this way has tender and juicy meat and a fried crust. Fans of Asian cuisine know a lot about the taste of hot-cooked duck. This meat is considered a delicacy.

You will love the recipe for hot smoked duck in a smokehouse. Place shavings and special chips from various wood species on the bottom of the smokehouse. Cover the chips with a special tray. The tray will collect the fat that drains from the duck carcass during the entire cooking process. Rods (or grates) are installed above the pallet. Place the meat on the racks. Leave gaps of at least one centimeter between pieces of meat if you want your smoked duck to be not only tasty, but also beautiful.

Heat the smokehouse chamber to a temperature of 80 degrees. The duck is kept in such conditions for at least an hour. Then the temperature is lowered to 40 degrees and smoking continues for 3.5-4 hours, the exact time will depend on the initial weight of the bird.

During the smoking process, pieces of meat (or a whole duck carcass) must be turned over from time to time for more uniform processing.

With liquid smoke

At home, hot smoked duck can be obtained using liquid smoke. Or rather, it will not be a completely smoked product, but still very tasty. Many housewives prefer this method of “smoking” duck meat. There is no fuss with sawdust and smoke, everything is clean and ultimately delicious.

The prepared duck (salting recipes are given above in the body of the article) is rubbed with a large amount of liquid smoke. This substance is probably familiar to everyone, but in case you haven’t paid attention to it before, let’s say that liquid smoke is a liquid that has a pronounced smoky aroma. A bottle of this substance is inexpensive. Can be found in grocery departments of stores.

So, after the bird carcass has undergone preliminary preparation (marination) and rubbing with liquid smoke, the duck needs to be baked in the oven in any way convenient for you. The finished baked bird will have the taste and aroma of a smoked product.

Cold smoked duck recipe

First you need to carry out all the preliminary manipulations: cutting, marinating, drying in the shade (4-5 hours). Now you can start cold smoking poultry meat.

The carcasses are placed on a grate or hung on rods in the smokehouse. Fill the smoke generator with wood chips, set it on fire and direct the smoke into the meat processing chamber. The entire smoking process lasts at a temperature of 25 to 35 degrees. Depending on the weight of the bird and how full the chamber is, smoking lasts from twenty-four hours to three days. After a day, pierce the carcass in the thickest places to check the degree of readiness of the product. If ichor is released at the puncture site, the meat is not yet ready to eat.

If you can’t wait to taste smoked duck as soon as possible, it is permissible to increase the temperature to 40 degrees. In this case, the duck will be ready in 8-10 hours. But experts say that a colder method and a long time of cold smoking make duck meat incredibly aromatic and tasty, so there is a reason to wait three days and not rush things by raising the temperature. During smoking, duck carcasses need to be sprayed (or doused) with the prepared brine in which they were simmered before entering the smokehouse.

Carcasses of finished smoked ducks after the process are hung in the shade, in a place with good air movement, for two hours. Here the meat will “reach” perfection: the pungent smell of smoke will disappear, and the bird will acquire that unique aroma and, most importantly, taste.

Prepared cold-smoked duck carcasses should be stored in the cold and always wrapped in wax paper. This method helps preserve the smoky flavor for a longer period of time. Regular baking foil works well for this purpose. Wrap each piece tightly so that there are no gaps. But the wisest decision would be to eat smoked duck, otherwise why have we worked tirelessly for so long? Invite your guests and treat them to a real delicacy.

In this article we will look at the simplest recipe for hot smoked duck. Duck itself has an original taste, which is not always worth supplementing with spices. A simple recipe will be available in any conditions: at the dacha, while hunting or on a hike.
Smoked duck acquires a unique taste and smell. In addition, smoked meat can be stored for a long time, which is very useful in camping conditions when there is often no time to cook, but you always want to eat.

Meat selection and preparation

In order for smoked duck to delight you with its exquisite taste, it is important to use the freshest possible meat in the preparation. To choose just such meat, you need to pay attention to the following points:

• It is better to buy chilled meat.
• Rich color of meat and absence of pronounced spots.
• No film or moisture on the meat. Fresh meat is almost dry to the touch.
• Elasticity of meat. A fingerprint on fresh meat quickly disappears.

Before smoking, the duck must be plucked and cleaned. To better remove feathers, the duck can be burned after plucking.

Then you need to thoroughly clean and wash the meat. You can smoke either a whole duck or a cut one - it depends on the size of the smokehouse and the duck.

Hot smoked duck recipe

We will use the simplest recipe in order to preserve the special taste of the duck itself and not spoil it with spices. To do this you will need:

• Duck meat.
• Salt, pepper.
• Garlic.
• Water.

Rub the duck with a mixture of salt and pepper, sprinkle with garlic and leave in a closed container for 4-8 hours.
Wild duck has tougher meat, and it can have a sharp, distinct smell, unlike store-bought duck. Therefore, wild duck meat needs to be pre-cooked for 15-20 minutes before being placed in the smokehouse. Then the duck needs to be washed and dried.
The duck is ready for direct smoking in the smokehouse.

Smoking process

As a smokehouse, especially in camping conditions, you can use fairly simple containers with a lid. But for convenience and to obtain the best taste, we recommend using special factory smokehouses.
For example, this convenient one, which you can buy on our website, has many advantages:

• High quality food grade stainless steel.
• A water seal that prevents smoke from escaping.
• Hose for smoke removal.
• Convenient trays for wood chips, fat and meat.
• Hooks for hanging.
• Thermometer for effective temperature control.

All these features allow you to use the smokehouse at home. It also has a mini 10 liter option that you can take with you on camping trips, and a large 30 liter smoker for smoking a large volume of meat.

Let's consider the smoking process using a smokehouseHanhi:

1. Alder, apple wood chips or bird cherry sawdust are poured onto the lowest tray.
2. The second tray from the bottom is for fat; we leave it empty.
3. The washed and dried meat is placed on top baking sheets or hung on hooks.
4. Close the lid and place on the coals.
5. After smoke appears, smoke the duck for 40-60 minutes. Make sure the smoke is white. Blue smoke is a sign of low heat, dark smoke means too much heat. The smoke temperature should be approximately 50-60°.
6. We check the readiness by piercing the meat; if ichor appears, continue smoking.