[Stoves] Reply to Tom Miles

[Erin Rasmussen]

-----Original Message-----
From: stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
[mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of
ajheggie at gmail.com

On Saturday 09 April 2011 10:24:14 you wrote:
> Dear stovers,
> Paal has smoked his fish, using the PekoPe for decades...


I'm not sure what smoking does to preserve food, it doesn't dry 
completely. 

What components of the smoke do the job? I imagine it's simply the 
pyrolysis offgas and the smouldering combustion just drives these off to 
do the job. If so then there is no reason why the material to be smoked 
could not hang above the tlud in a chamber prior to the secondary 
combustion. It would need to be in a small ante chamber to keep the 
temperature down.
-----end Original Message snip -----


Hi Andrew,

Typically, when you smoke fish, you brine it before hand
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoked_salmon) and the salt in the brine
mixture starts the process of curing the meat. Then the slow smoking process
dries out the salty meat in a carefully controlled way, preserving the food
(but not indefinitely).  

You just need a small source of ignition to smoke the wood you are using as
flavor, and to provide enough heat and dry air in the smoking chamber to
keep it at the right temperature and humidity. Any efficient stove or heat
source will do the job. I've seen it done with an aluminum packet of wood
chips on an electric hot plate. 

Erin Rasmussen
erin at trmiles.com