on top of old smokey

For our "Sunday" Memorial Day we're gettin' together with the neighbors(those harboring the amazing American Pride smoker) and cooking-out. No one is certain when the actual owners of the smoker will come claim their baby back(!) so it's been decided this is our "experimental" smoke (hedging all bets with a massive pork butt, just in case).

by request I'm grilling James Oseland's chicken satay and making his Javanese "peanut sauce" to go with

...as for the smoker part of the equation I've been doing research and am envisioning fish...some thick fleshed steak-form(?) fish (whole smoked fish *appears to be frowned upon* unless it's of the chub variety)...preferably not salmon(I'll see what looks good at Asia Mart come the weekend)...hot-smoked over cherry then served either with an herbed aioli or shallot/lemon zest thingie...perhaps atop very-lightly dressed baby greens...(some reserved for near future dips and/or tomato sauce)

the fish portion of the day is meant to tide us over before the main events of pork butt and satay(Carolina BBQ and Indonesian street food...quite a combination!)

I'm also planning on smoking tomatoes just to see what's what and maybe making a smoked sweet tomato jam to pair with duck pate or parma prosciutto and butter on toasts of a rustic loaf(or perhaps biscuits if I went solely with the ham?)

Q:

anyone have any hot-smoking of thick-fleshed, fatty, fish insights? I'm finding differing info in both my culinary library and online...

...I'd prefer to smoke a whole(scaled, gutted, cleaned fish) if possible

and smoking tomatoes? (not to the dried stage...fyi)

thank you kindly

Can you get your hands on a grouper? That should fill the bill. If not, try a snapper, though it's not as thick and fatty (but a dammed good fish over the coals).

Chris,

I like whole salmon, give it a light brine in kosher salt and a bit of sugar, set the fish on the smoker grate cavity side down in the shape of a lazy S, so it looks likes it swimming and leave alone until just barely cooked through. I've done this a number of times and typically, just for shits and giggles, stick a fish hook in it's mouth. (Bruce Cook's idea, which I have copied)

Enjoy,
Gary

I'm not averse to doing salmon...your rec might've just swung my internal vote, although I still need to see what looks best at the fishmonger Saturday. If I do get a whole fish(probably Saturday) I plan on securing it under refrigeration overnight then quick-brining Sunday mid-morning, then into the smoker it goes for 1 and a half to 2 hours. I like the hook idea

Sometimes the Chinese mkt fish selection will contain something nice, big and fat. Might be a good bet to swing by there tomorrow AM, just in case.

[I dasn't say its well-known name aloud but there's a real nice grilled Indonesian pepes ikan mas here. And I bet you could get a nice one of these fish many places in Indianapolis.]

Geo

Why not smoke local(ish) and go with a nice smoked whitefish?

I'm open to anything that looks like it'll work in the smoker. I figured on perusing the tanks at this one Asian market simply because I'll be there stocking up on other ingredients. If they don't offer anything appealing then I'll head to one of the seafood counters near-ish by. It's the Indy 500 this weekend so I'm a little worried about availability of some things, but guess that whole fish won't be among them...burgers and brats should be afraid...very afraid this Sunday.

As for the carp: that sounds good and I have everything but the salam leaves(I do have bay) and banana leaves on hand already...I wonder if I could smoke/steam a fish using the banana leaves even if I don't go with that particular recipe(sure looks tasty tho').

I'm sure that the banana leaves would do the job for just about anything.

Geo

Thank you all for the tips.

As per usual, there were some last minute adjustments:

instead of pork butt I(yep, I got to man the smoker all by myself...woohoo!) did three racks of St. Louis ribs done up in Chris's Rub-us Esoterica

neighbor concocted the BBQ sauce including my rub(I smoked the ribs sans sauce)...we were rightfully proud of our collaboration, I think

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I grilled my chicken satay

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smoked the "giant" cherry tomatoes, but left them as is for our vegetable portion

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went with Geo's link, except, long story short, did two medium-sized trout(it was meant to be an experiment...just enough so anyone who wanted could get a bite or two) and ground the listed aromatics into a paste adding
"after Oseland" the nifty seasoning of superior light soy and fresh squeezed(of course) lime juice

90 minute smoke(no pre-marinade, no brine) yielded some delicious, tensile fish just beautiful in those banana leaves...a light smoke and subtle paste that brought to the fore some gorgeous trout

a fly-fisherman friend of ours said it was some of the best trout he's had(and there weren't no leftovers of nothing else neither...well, except for the gargantuan vat of peanut sauce...I made waaaay too much...)

very cool (and who'da thunk...the fish, it came from Whole Foods...looooong story how we wound up there after going to several stores and nixing some truly monstrous carp at Asia Market...which the s/o said no way, Jose' to...and that was that)

...tho' I've had dubious encounters in the past with other Whole Foods' fish displays, the guy at the Nora Plaza Whole Foods(previously Wild Oats) was great to talk to and seemed proud of his product

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so a polyglot...

13 diners + smoked and grilled Indonesian/Javanese meats + St. Louis ribs

assorted coleslaws and salads

southsides, citrus bourbon concoctions, whole hibiscus in syrup and cava, beer, whiskey drank from the bottle

and god knows how many rounds of cornhole


on meine blog uploaded a ton of pics including(tard's the end) a shot of some of the ribs and tomatoes from Sunday:

http://pics.livejournal.com/malcarne/pic/00002c83/