Yes, you guessed it. I was canning fish again this summer. My BIL dropped off 4 pink salmon and a coho salmon last night. 21 half pts of fish now done. Fish cut up and put into jars. Add a tiny bit of salt and put the lids on. Lids on and stacked in the pressure canner. Bring it up to 10 lbs. and sit and stare at it for 100 mins. Got some sock knitting done. Out of the pressure cooker and waiting to cool. This will taste good this winter.
Dang, I love salmon. What is your preferred method of eating it? I've always been partial to a triscuit cracker with some cream cheese and a chunk of salmon myself.
Meat canning isn't hard, you just have to be very careful to follow the processing exactly. Fish is quite easy as it goes in raw. Beef and chicken needs pre-cooking first. I love salmon sandwiches. Mix canned salmon with green onions, celery, mayo and a little dillweed - serve in a sandwich. Campinspecter does a real good salmon loaf with canned salmon. My BIL brought over a serving for two of fresh coho so we just baked it rolled in crumbs with a bit of dillweed. We have been trying to eat more fish seeing as we are in a fishing community. Not a lot of boats sell at the dock so the BIL is very generous with his catches.
I like to smoke it 1 hour then to the jars. eat with cracker, make salmon salad, just out of the jar is good too. spine bones are like frozen M&Ms, good calcium. Coho: A batch of smoked sockeye fillets, salt & brown sugar brine. : Sockeye are running now. Will be headed out after a few soon.
dear God. Between you and woodwidow, I'm really jonesing to head up to salmon country and stock up my freezer! Salmon is one of my favorite foods on earth and here you guys are up to your elbows in it. I'm jealous.
No kidding. I want to make a trip there and get about a ton of it to bring back home. I love salmon almost as good as steak.
I'm not big on fish. I'll eat a bit, but most of what I catch usually ends up as dog or chicken food.
Bogy: That LOOKS AWESOME....... I'll never get to do that process, but man does thats put hunger in the stomach any part of the day...
Lots of pinks out in the water this year but the sockeye aren't running yet. I think we are getting a coho opening pretty soon. My coho was a hatchery fish release that BIL caught. I may get more coho once the fishery opens.
Yes it is dry canned. I don't add liquid to the jars as they produce enough liquid during the processing. The jar on the left is Spring salmon and you can see that it is oilier than the pink salmon on the right. Some people add oil to the jars but I find salmon has enough oil in it for flavour and to keep it from drying out. The richest salmon is Sockeye and after it has been canned for a couple months, it has the most intense flavour of the salmons.
I have yet to pressure can -though I bought one from the 1930's last summer(don't have the weights for the relief). Fish from the warm lakes around here smell like fish when you pull them from the water not really very good on the pallet even fried which normally masks the bad flavor. Pressure cookers sort of scare me even though I used to commission 2000-3000psi boilers which is sort of weird.....but 10-20psi in an enclosed vessel is still license requirement in some states
My advice on using a pressure cooker - NEVER!!!! leave the pressure cooker alone while it is under pressure especially if you are using a pressure gauge and not weights. If the pressure is getting too high, you can turn the heat off and move it off the burner immediately. My BIL rebuilt a couple of old pressure cookers with new gaskets and weights. We found Presto's on-line store and got the parts from them. He converted one from using a pressure gauge indicator to the weights. I think the weights are safer but I have used mine with a pressure gauge for over 30 years. It has a metal to metal seal and isn't dependent on gaskets. Google your brand of pressure cooker and you might find parts to update it. I also have a small pressure cooker that I do blade or round steaks, stewing beef and chicken and turkey carcass for soup stock in. It uses weights and because it is small, it is easier to control the pressure. 15 mins for blade steaks to be tender enough to cut with a butter knife.
