Kiawe grilling planks

The Founder's Smoked Fish

Brine + pellicle + 2-4 hrs smoke · Easy · Any firm fish

The house cure, refined over years of putting speared and caught fish into kiawe smoke. Three things matter and one of them matters most: a simple brine, a rinse at the salinity of the ocean the fish came from, and the pellicle — the tacky, glossy skin the fillet forms as it air-dries. The pellicle is the biggest thing. Smoke doesn't stick to wet fish; it slides off with the moisture. Give the fillet its pellicle and every minute in the smoke lands.

The island finish is the founder's twist: a warm kiawe honey and shoyu baste painted on the moment the fish comes off the smoker — warm fish drinks it in — or a shoyu-ginger boost stirred straight into the brine. Kiawe honey comes from the blossoms of the same tree as the wood in your smoker. The tree flavors this fish twice.

The Numbers

  • Pit: 165-180F
  • Pull At: 145F, flakes but still glistens
  • Time: Brine + pellicle + 2-4 hrs
  • Burn: Kiawe pellets, or chunks on a low fire

Ingredients

  • 2-4 lbs firm fish fillets, skin on - salmon, trout, marlin, ono, ahi
  • Brine: 1 cup coarse salt + 1 cup sugar + 1 gallon filtered water, stirred until dissolved
  • Rinse: sea salt + filtered water mixed to ocean salinity, about 1/2 cup per gallon - it should taste like the sea
  • Island baste: 3 Tbsp kiawe honey (any raw honey works) + 1 Tbsp shoyu + 1 tsp grated ginger, warmed
  • Or the brine boost: add 1/2 cup shoyu + 1/4 cup brown sugar + a smashed thumb of ginger + a strip of lemon peel to the gallon
  • A cookie cooling rack and a fan on low - the pellicle station

Method

  1. Submerge the fillets in the cold brine, in the fridge: 4 hours for thin fillets, 6-8 for standard, 8-12 for thick slabs. Don't overshoot - past 12 hours it just gets saltier.
  2. Rinse in the ocean-salinity sea salt water, not fresh - fresh water pulls the cure back out of the surface unevenly. An ocean-strength rinse cleans the fillet without undoing the brine.
  3. The pellicle - the biggest thing: fillets on the cooling rack, fan on low, 1-2 hours until the surface turns tacky and glossy like lacquer. Smoke sticks to pellicle. Skip this and the flavor slides off with the moisture.
  4. Smoke at 165-180F until 145F internal - 2 to 4 hours depending on thickness. Thin blue smoke, never white.
  5. The moment it comes off, paint it with the warm honey-shoyu baste - the warm fish drinks it in and sets to a soft gloss as it cools.
  6. Cool completely before wrapping. Better the next day; keeps a week in the fridge. It will not last a week.

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