Dimensions of the smokehouse for hot smoking

Factory-made and home-made smokehouses for hot smoking are becoming more and more popular from season to season among those who are accustomed to prefer home-made products. A person buying a smoking device is faced with a number of questions about what criteria to rely on when choosing, and what is worth taking into account.

How to decide on the size of a smokehouse for hot smoking

The first and main question that the buyer will face will be the question of the dimensions of the purchased device. In order to answer this, you must first decide what size fish the device is purchased for. Naturally, if the owner of the smokehouse is an avid fisherman who returns from fishing with a multi-kilogram catch of large fish, then a mini-smokehouse will not suit him.

Reference! We are talking specifically about fish because a medium device with standard dimensions of 450x250x250 mm is suitable for smoking poultry, meat products or lard.

There are three “basic” parameters for the size of smokehouses:

• length;
• height;
• width.

For smoking large fish, devices with chambers at least 500 mm long are ideal. Width is an equally important parameter, since for good smoking there must be small gaps of free space between the fish carcasses. Devices less than 250 mm wide are not suitable for such purposes.

As for the height, for average volumes of “raw materials” two tiers of gratings will be quite sufficient. For large fish, the height of the smokehouse should be at least 300 mm.

Reference! Another small advantage of a wide smokehouse is that the products in it can be placed both along and across the “sides” for better quality of processing with smoke.

What else should you consider when choosing a smokehouse?

Other important criteria for choosing smokehouses include:

1. Wall thickness. The fact is that the thinner the walls of the structure, the sooner it deforms from temperature changes or mechanical damage. The rule in this case is simple - the thicker the better. However, we should not forget that the thickness of the walls directly affects the weight of the device, and therefore its mobility.
2. Cover type. Most experts agree that the optimal choice would be to use “house”-shaped covers, since they have an additional stiffening rib in the middle that resists possible deformation.
3. Place of use. If a smokehouse is purchased for use in a summer cottage, then the owner does not need to worry too much about its dimensions and weight. It’s another matter if the device is planned to be used on hikes and fishing, where every kilogram of excess weight and every centimeter of free space in transport becomes worth its weight in gold. If we are talking about home smoking, then you should give preference to the standard dimensions of the device, which were given above.
4. Smoking frequency. In cases where the user intends to smoke food no more than several times a season, then one can give preference to budget thin-walled models. The thickness of their walls usually does not exceed one millimeter.

The above recommendations will help you decide on the size and other parameters of smokehouses.