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[scouterjames]

Pam is awesome on the racks.

Ive been running a wet brine and the basics are 1kg demmererra sugar,1 cup salt 3 litres of water,juoice from a lemon and spices,wine,whatever etc to taste.

I like to brush with Maple Syrop and then sprinkle it with some fresh cracked pepper when it comes out of the smoker.

I never use Pam (or other cooking sprays).  They contain nasty propellants (mostmake use of a hydrocarbon such as propane or iso-butane) and also lecithin (a soy derivative to help mix the oil and water) that builds up on the cooking surfaces that don't have food on them (it ends up a sticky brown goo that's next to impossible to scrub off!).

Either buy a pump sprayer that you pour oil into and pump air pressure yourself, or pour a bit of oil into a bowl, dip a papertowel into it and rub down the grill.  Healthier and saves the environment at the same time!

[Navy Seal Fisherman]

I don't understand why people add water to the brine when they are actually trying to remove water from the salmon 

Try a dry brine for them...

Put fillets cut in 1.5 inch strips skin side down in a glass dish. Sprinkle liberally with course kosher salt and brown sugar (30%/70%).

Leave salmon in fridge for about 5 hours. Take out, rinse off, pat dry and put on oiled racks.

Now you can get creative with whatever spice you want. I like a little pepper and hot pepper which I sprinkle on the fillet pieces. This is how you control the flavor.

The fillets must dry on the rack, in the fridge for 24 hours. That's how they get the pellicle or glaze on the surface.

Then smoke as you would normally.

Hi AF, clarification

Salt to demera ratio, in this post you said 30 % salt 70% demera. In another on 1 of my threads you said 2/3 salt 1/3 sugar. Which is the correct ratio? thx.  just purchased the ingredients

[alwaysfishn]

Hi AF, clarification

Salt to demera ratio, in this post you said 30 % salt 70% demera. In another on 1 of my threads you said 2/3 salt 1/3 sugar. Which is the correct ratio? thx.  just purchased the ingredients

Old age I guess.....    It's 2/3 salt and 1/3 sugar. I've seen some recipes with more sugar than salt, however they also leave the fish in the brine for 12 hours or more. With my ratio it's really important that it's not left in the brine for more than 3.5 hours. I just finished smoking the last batch of sockeye that I plan on doing this year. Every batch I've done we've been really happy with. I have it fine tuned now that I stack the tail pieces on the top and remove them after 2.5 hours as I found these thin pieces were too salty when I left them for the full 3.5 hours. Until this year I've smoked only springs and the odd coho. That's why I would have written 5 hours in that thread.

I arrived at this by experimenting over the years and this works best for my taste. When you do yours experiment with a smoker tray full using a different ratio or time. That's the great thing about dry brines is it's really easy to experiment.

Let us know how it turns out.