Smoking salmon

To smoke salmon properly takes at least three persons. The smoker I remember to be my mother, but equally important was my grandmother who originally taught my mother and hovered for many years to give a real-time commentary on mother's technique. You also need a fire tender, a 10 year-old boy with a squirt gun or Windex bottle full of water works best. It also helps to have someone who can catch salmon.

Recipe:

Filet the salmon and cover filets with rock salt for at least three hours until excess water is drawn out the fish.

Brush salt off of the fish and then rub the fish with garlic butter.

Collect fresh alder branches one half inch in diameter.

Strip the leaves and discard.

Build a smoldering fire of alder in the bottom of the smoke house or cooker.

Place salmon filets on open racks in cooker.

Check to see that temperature inside the cooker does not exceed 150 degrees Fahrenheit.

The object is not to cook the fish but to cure it by virtue of the tannic alder smoke.

Add green alder to keep the fire smothered, and extinguish open flame with squirt gun.

Smoking takes 6 to 8 hours depending on the thickness of the filets.