Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Charlie can you pls give approximations on the quantities of salt and sugar to get me started?

I usually do 1tbsp of salt, 1tbsp of brown sugar to every litre of water.

Heres a thread with different ideas...

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13614&hilit=brine

Good job on the trout catch, cook and smoke Colours. Looks like a lot of fun

Nice work Colours

Thanks guys, thanks Charlie. Looking forward to trying it through the week.

Just been catching up on this thread. Nice going Carolin, thanks for all the info and pics, really appreciated it.

Regards, Martin.

My pleasure Martin, glad to finally give something back after all my newbie questions. How's your system going?

On Friday night I pulled out the remaining trout, I haven't done a head count yet but there were very few left unaccounted for. Largest weighed in at just over 500g which I am over the moon with given our short season and warm October. After spending a grueling night killing and gutting them I was beginning to wonder if it was worth all the work.

Today I was smoking the trout in my new smoke house. Using varying woodchips for each batch. I've used apple, beech and hickory. I'm not sure if I did the right thing by pre-soaking the beech ones cause they didn't seem to produce much smoke. The taste test will give me that answer.

Had a slight technical hiccup tho. My flame went out I discovered. I opened the door and could smell gas so what do I do? Press the ignition button. Big big problem. I now have burns to a fair bit of my upper body and look like I have alopecia. Luckily I work in a hospital so am lucky enough to be in air con and have round the clock treatment during my shift tonight.

I am so lucky not to have Been blinded and my toddler was standing right next to me, it could have been so much worse.

Please don't point out that I'm an eeejet cause I already know. I was even expecting something to happen to me after killing all those beautiful trout. I'm just glad karma left my child alone.

ANYHOO I learnt a lesson today and am sitting down to a beautiful smoked trout salad, although I'm in pain I think I will definitely be doing trout again next season, it has certainly been an adventure!

Definitely adventurous, although not in a good way! I hope you recover from the unexpected heating soon and can enjoy your trout.

Glad you escaped Colours, wish it was totally though. Sounds like you need a lockout cover for the ignite button to slow you up just a bit. Sometimes reflex is a bad thing.

Hope you recover fast

So sorry about the burns, sounds nasty.

Which flavor was best for the trout, apple, beech or hickory?

Thanks guys feeling much better already.

Didn't get a chance to taste test before I buggered off to hospital in a hurry, but my 1st lot was apple, smelt so good I had to try so I did. It was soo different from the store bought stuff. Difficult to describe, mild but very smokey. I guess it was smokey without the bitterness? It was still warm, I will do a taste test and report back. I have one batch to go to finish them if I can brave my smokehouse tomorrow, I plan to do apple and garlic powder.

I meant to say it was still warm, the flavour develops as it cools so I will do a comparison tomorrow and report back.

It's 1am and 31 degrees outside. I'm glad I got the trout out on Friday...

Hi Colours, glad you're okay. Sounds like a scary experience but they say if it doesn't kill you it will make you stronger.

Hope you recover quickly and let us know the smoking results.

Martin.