Smoked products, in addition to excellent taste, retain all the useful substances of the original product and have a long shelf life. Traditionally, two types of smoking are distinguished - hot and cold. In this article we will tell you how to breathe new life into a refrigerator that has served its age, turning it into a home smokehouse. To do this, you need a minimum of tools and several hours of free time.
Preparing to make a smokehouse from the refrigerator
The content of the article
- Preparing to make a smokehouse from the refrigerator
- Advantages and disadvantages of a homemade smokehouse from the refrigerator
- How to make a cold smokehouse out of an old refrigerator
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Making a smoke-cured smokehouse from the refrigerator: step-by-step instructions
- Street way
- Home way
A refrigerator is an excellent basis for making your own smokehouse. Most preferred are old models made in the USSR. They are distinguished by a more durable metal case and a minimum number of plastic elements.
The key to a positive result is careful preparation.
Regardless of the type of smokehouse, the first thing you should start with is to dismantle and remove all plastic elements and rubber seals from the refrigerator. This simple operation will protect your culinary masterpieces from unpleasant odors and harmful substances that can release these materials at high temperatures.
After dismantling the rubber seals, it is necessary to resolve the issue of how to fix the door in the closed position. On some models of old refrigerators there is a standard mechanism for fixing the door. If you are a happy owner of this modification - feel free to proceed to the next paragraph, if not - it is necessary to fix an additional device on the case, providing a snug fit of the door to case.
Then you have to decide how you will stir the products when smoking. Traditionally, they are either suspended or laid out on grates. Most owners of smokehouses prefer to suspend products, believing that in this way space is used more rationally. We also recommend staying with this option: just fix the standard grill from the refrigerator under the ceiling and place several wire hooks on it.
The preparatory phase has been successfully completed, before the start of the next you must decide exactly what type of smoking products you want to receive.
Traditionally distinguish:
- hot smoked devices;
- cold smoked devices;
- universal (depending on the configuration, they can work both in one and the other mode).
Advantages and disadvantages of a homemade smokehouse from the refrigerator
Using an old refrigerator for smoking is an excellent option for a stationary smokehouse, which does not require large funds and time for its manufacture. Provides the ability to cook at the same time a significant amount of smoked meats. With proper use, such a device can serve you for many years.
Attention! The disadvantages of this type of installation are its dimensions and, as a result, the lack of mobility.
If you and your loved ones love smoked products and the place on your site allows you to place a machine of such an impressive size, then a smokehouse from the refrigerator is your option.
If you eat smoked meat quite rarely, you want to be able to take the smokehouse with you on hikes or a place on your site is limited - perhaps you should rent a refrigerator for scrap and buy a small portable smokehouse volume.
How to make a cold smokehouse out of an old refrigerator
Cold-smoked products retain all vitamins and nutrients in their composition. They are cooked at low temperature under the influence of cold white smoke. This method of smoking is recommended by nutritionists.
The design of a cold smoked smokehouse is somewhat more complicated. The main difference is that the body of the smokehouse and the hearth in which the wood chips are smoldering should be separated. The hearth is connected to the smoking chimney so that the smoke enters the smoking chamber at a temperature not exceeding 30 degrees.
Important! Smoke in a cold smoked smokehouse acts as a preservative and kills all harmful microbes, however, given its low temperature, the smoking process should continue for at least a day.
For the final transformation of the refrigerator into a cold smoked smoking chamber, it is necessary to make a hole for the chimney in the bottom of the case. To ensure that smoke enters the working chamber, it is necessary to take care of the draft: for this, the hearth is placed a little lower in the vertical plane, and the chimney is placed at an angle.
If possible, the terrain is used for this. If you have a completely flat area, you need to dig a recess under the hearth, an inclined trench for the chimney, and directly place the smokehouse on an artificial hill.
The difficulty lies in the correct selection of the length of the chimney. The length is selected so that the smoke in the chimney cools down and comes into the smokehouse at a temperature of 27-30 degrees. Experience shows that the length of an underground chimney should be about three meters. A more accurate figure is selected experimentally, since it depends on many parameters of the chimney - inclination, cross-sectional area, wall material, etc.
Creating a cold smoked smokehouse, in addition to the smoking chamber, requires a separate arrangement of the hearth and chimney and is quite time-consuming.
Making a smoke-cured smokehouse from the refrigerator: step-by-step instructions
During hot smoking, products are exposed to smoke at a temperature of one hundred or more degrees, while the smoking process itself takes very little time, about an hour or two. It is believed that with this treatment, foods lose some of their vitamins, and under certain circumstances carcinogens are formed.
Making a hot smoked smokehouse is somewhat easier. Simply place the electric stove on the bottom of the prepared smoking cabinet, placing on it a pallet with wood chips for smoking. And choose a mode of heating the spiral, in which the chips in the pan smolder, but in no case ignites.
Attention! Always keep the wood chips moist, thereby increasing the amount of smoke, minimizing the risk of fire.
As practice shows, gourmets manage to equip smoke-cured smokehouses both outdoors and right in the apartment.
Street way
When installing a smokehouse on the street, in addition to the method described above with an electric stove, you can place the hearth directly under the refrigerator in the ground, and pour sawdust directly to the bottom of the smokehouse cameras.
Moreover, to increase the resource, it is desirable to lay an additional sheet of metal with a thickness of about 3 mm between the bottom of the refrigerator and the hearth.
Home way
We do not recommend this, but some arrange a smokehouse right in the apartment. To do this, a smokehouse with an electric stove as a smoke generator is equipped with a chimney, connecting it with the exhaust system of the house. It is also worth additionally sealing the junction of the door to the chamber, it is optimal to use heat-resistant rubber gaskets for ovens for this.
Now you know how to make a convenient smokehouse out of an old refrigerator without possessing any special skills.
