A thermometer in your smokehouse: Great thing

Have you already smoked some goodies for Christmas? If not, now it is the right time to do it. We shall focus on the temperature of the smoke, which is extremely important. There are three basic smoking methods, which may be divided according to the smoke temperature. To measure the smoke temperature you need a quality thermometer. Many people buy a traditional food thermometer with a sensor inside the smokehouse and place a display of some kind outside. So what it is so important about the smoke temperature?

Cold smoke smoking

First, let us introduce the cold smoke method. This method utilizes smoke temperature ranging from 15 to 30 °C. The meat must be completely dried before smoking and the total smoking time is usually in the order of days, or even weeks!. And what meets are smoked in this way? Most often ham and some salamis, possibly sausages and other foods.The cold smoking method is extremely demanding in terms of the technique and only very experienced people should do it.

Photo: Radek Štěpán

Warm smoke smoking

This method uses smoke temperature from 45 to 70 °C and the usual smoking time is between 12 and 20 hours. It depends on the type of meat you are smoking. Meat is usually preheated to 60 °C before smoking. This smoking method is probably the most popular for home smoking. Meat prepared in this way has the typical smoky taste and strong aroma. You will certainly agree if you smoke meat at home.

The last is the hot smoke method where the temperature ranges from 60 to 95 °C and the smoking time is between 8 and 12 hours. If you are going to smoke pre-cooked ham or sausages, the time is reduced to 2 or 3 hours. That should be enough. However, the shelf life of foods smoked in this way is reduced. In any case, the final products prepared in this way will be unique in taste, incomparable to the “smoked” stuff you buy in your supermarket.

Preview photo: Radek Štěpán