Useful tips for creating a cold smoking smokehouse with your own hands from a barrel
Cold smoked products have a refined aroma and taste unlike meat cooked over hot smoke.
Therefore, many owners of private houses and garden plots prefer to make their own smokehouses not for hot, but for cold or combined smoking. Such a device is convenient because it is universal.
Content
How to choose and make a container for a cold smoking smokehouse from a 200 liter barrel
In cold smoking smokehouses, the product chamber and the firebox are located at some distance from each other and are hermetically connected to each other by a chimney.
This design allows you to obtain cooled smoke, the temperature of which decreases during movement along the channel from one node to another.
The smoking chamber and the hearth can be made of different materials. A barrel, capacious and durable, with a volume of 200 litersAny metal (not plastic!) container will do for setting up a cold smoking smokehouse.
If you have an oil or fuel barrel, you can also use it, but after preliminary treatment. First, you need to wipe the walls of the container and its bottom as clean as possible, and then burn it on a fire.
There is no other way to get rid of the foreign smell. Then the barrel is cleaned again, this time from soot and carbon. If there is hydrodynamic mini-wash "Karcher" or its equivalent, rinse the container thoroughly. After that, it will be ready to serve as a smoking chamber for any products.
Choosing the design of a cold smoking smokehouse
There are two main working units in a cold smoking smokehouse:
- smoking chamber (otherwise it is called a "smoke cabinet");
- hearth (also known as a stove).
You can make both the first and the second unit from a barrel, but it is better to use this container as a smoke cabinet. If you decide to build a fireplace in the second barrel, it is recommended to install it horizontally rather than vertically. A container laid on its side will serve as good protection from the wind, and it will be much easier to maintain.
Which fireplace is more convenient?
For stationary cold smoking smokehouses designed for many years of service, a solid hearth is required. In this case, either a mini-oven is laid out of bricks, or the well-known metal "potbelly stove" is used.
The firebox can also be built in the ground by digging a rectangular hole with a depth of 30–40 cmIn this case, the optimal design of a cold smoking smokehouse will look like this:
- a hole dug in the ground;
- a trench that is hermetically sealed from above;
- a barrel installed directly above it without a bottom, but with a lid.
How to build a chimney
An important element of the design is the chimney. It can be laid both underground and above ground. You can find different opinions about which of these options is better. When choosing, you need to focus on the fact that the purpose of the chimney is to cool the smoke.
Attention! If the property is located in a climate zone with predominantly high temperatures, it is reasonable to build a smoke channel. underground typeIn this case, the smoke will cool down much faster than in a chimney under the hot sun.
There are several options for arranging a channel for the passage of smoke.
- Metal pipe.
- A trench, tightly covered from above with any suitable materials: boards with polyethylene and soil, stainless steel sheets, slate sheets, plywood, tarpaulin, concrete blocks or slabs, etc.
- A solid building made of brick or stone.
Each owner chooses the type of cold smoking smokehouse that suits his particular case.
Optimal chimney parameters:
- length 3 m;
- height 25–27 cm;
- width 30–50 cm.
Reference! If the length of the above-ground chimney is not sufficient to fully cool the smoke, this process can be speed up, hanging a wet rag on the pipe.
Location of the smokehouse
Cold smoking is a long process that takes from 5 to 7 days for one batch of products. This largely determines the choice of location for the smokehouse.
Important! First of all, it should be comfortable, allowing you to lay out food and sit down while servicing the firebox; the fireplace should be located away from green spaces and wooden buildings. In addition, there must be enough space to build a chimney.
The device of the simplest cold smoking smokehouse with your own hands: photo
- Markup.
Before starting work, it is highly advisable to sketch out a drawing of the future smokehouse by hand. In accordance with it, you need to make markings on the ground. For this you will need pegs, a tape measure of length not less than 5 m, marking cord or twine.
At the place where the barrel is installed, pegs are driven in so that a square is formed, the dimensions of which are smaller than the diameter of the barrel. by 15–20 cm. On the side of the square from which the smoke channel will depart, measure 30–50 cm so that this section is located exactly in the middle; these points of the chimney outlet are marked with pegs.
Photo 1. The layout drawing of the cold smoking smokehouse is the first thing you should start working with.
In the direction of the channel, measure with a tape measure 3 m and install a peg; do the same with the second wall of the channel. Stretch a marking cord between the pegs at the square and the pegs at the beginning of the chimney. Start marking the firebox (its optimal dimensions are: the width is 20–30 cm greater than the width of the chimney, the length is 50–60 cm).
- Excavation.
They remove the soil to a depth 30–40 cm according to the completed marking lines.
- Soil leveling and compaction.
If the soil at the work site is unstable (mainly sand or sandy loam), it will be necessary to strengthen the walls of the dug trenches in any convenient way. For the chimney and the location of the smoking chamber, you can choose boards, slate, metal sheets. To strengthen the walls of the firebox, you can use only non-combustible materials. The best option is to lay its walls with brick or stone.
- Design of the upper part of the firebox.
To regulate the intensity of smoldering and burning, a damper must be constructed above the firebox. For this, a metal sheet of suitable size is used. It must fit tightly to the edges of the firebox to prevent wind blowing through. For this purpose, the firebox neck is designed 1-2 rows bricks laid on mortar.
- Preparing the barrel.
The main purpose of the oven is to accommodate food. To do this, it must be properly equipped. Food can be placed on grates or hung on hooks. The latter are traditionally used curved in the form of a letter S wire. The grates must be metal only. You can make them yourself from scrap materials or use ready-made solutions (for example, grates from an old refrigerator).
Photo 2. The metal grate on which the meat is smoked should be conveniently equipped.
To place them inside the barrel, supports are needed. You can take the simplest route: line them up opposite each other 2 rows of bricks, which in turn consist of from 2-3 bricks, laid on top of each other like a spoon. The grate is installed on this support.
But there is another way to save the space occupied by the bricks in the previous version. Four holes are drilled in the walls of the barrel at the same height. Bolts of the corresponding diameter are inserted into them and tightened with nuts. The grate is installed on these protruding pins, which can be connected crosswise with wire.
The rods with hooks are attached in a similar way: two holes are drilled (one on each of the opposite walls of the barrel) and a rod is inserted into them, onto which hooks are then put.
Photo 3. Rods with S-shaped hooks are attached to special pins that serve as a support.
- Installing the barrel.
The barrel should be installed at the end point of the chimney so that there are no gaps between it and the channel. This can be achieved in different ways. You can put the container directly on the ground and seal the gaps with it. Build a brick platform over the channel in the form of a pipe, the size of which corresponds to the barrel.
- Sealing of the smoke channel.
The chimney is covered along its entire length with any suitable material and covered with soil on top.
Important points for using a smokehouse
In order for the smoke to be able to leave the barrel, but at the same time remain in it for a long time, the smoking chamber is covered with wet burlap on top. It also has an additional cooling effect.
Useful video
The video clearly shows how to make a smokehouse suitable for cold and hot smoking.
Comments
Many buckets and tanks in which various paints and varnishes are sold have this design (based on the principle of closing with a lid). Just carefully empty these containers from the remains of the product and steam them.
But this is not the main thing. The main thing is to provide for the installation of thermometers in the smokehouse design to control the temperature of the smoking process. And best of all, two thermometers - on the chimney pipe and the smoking chamber.