Smoking cabinets: devices for cold and hot smoking. Gourmet device - do-it-yourself wooden smokehouse Wooden smoking cabinet

The method of preparing smoked food in stores cannot be called beneficial for the body, because preservatives, flavorings, and chemical smoke substitutes are used for this. At the same time, smoked meats prepared with one's own hand are not only harmless, but also incredibly tasty. How to smoke meat or fish at home? There is a way out - to make a smoking cabinet with your own hands, which will take 3-4 hours on the strength, and it will be possible to use it for several years.

What to do?

You can make a smoking cabinet for cold or hot smoking with your own hands from various materials. For this, any case items with a side and top door that can be hermetically sealed are used. For cabinets made by hand, one of the following structures is suitable for cold smoking:

  • body of an old refrigeration freezer;
  • metal pencil case;
  • a safe for storing weapons;
  • gas oven;
  • old washing machine with centrifuge;
  • a rectangular oblong container;
  • pipes of large diameters;
  • metal barrels.

Scheme of the future design

A unique cabinet for cold smoking can be made from wooden saw cuts and bars. And, despite the simplicity of such designs, do-it-yourself smokers have a wide range of possibilities. In addition, smoking cabinets allow you to cook delicious and fragrant meat, fish, seafood, vegetables and other goodies.

Structural elements

If you are wondering how to make a wooden cabinet with your own hands, then it will certainly not be superfluous if you know which structural elements it consists.

The base of the box is a wooden frame made of bars with a section of 4x4 cm. You can see detailed drawings of a do-it-yourself cold smoking cabinet in this publication.

Body part

Regardless of which case you have chosen for a home-made smoking installation, it must be sheathed on 3 sides with a board 2.5 cm thick and up to 10 cm wide. For these purposes, lining made of aspen, linden, alder and others is suitable. deciduous trees. If you could not find a lining, although this is a fairly common wooden canvas, then you can use a coniferous polymer.

A cabinet for smoking from boards, assembled by hand, should be as sealed as possible. This is a completely feasible task if, in the manufacture of a smokehouse, a sealing material of the type of hemp rope is used, which must be inserted into all joints of the facing material.

Door

The door is made according to the dimensions of the entire size of the front wall of the smoking unit. She is going on her own wooden frame from boards 2.5x10 cm so that the covering material of the frame part fits snugly into the opening, and the protruding part of the skin covers the upper joint. The perimeter of the entire opening is glued with sealing food rubber, which can be any gum from the refrigerator or oven. If your household arsenal does not have one, then it can easily be made from a felt strip.

A pair of hinges is attached to the door itself, which can be either overhead or mortise - it all depends solely on the level of your skill. The door is also equipped with a latch. The door, as well as the body itself, must be completely sealed with hemp rope or, on extreme case, tow. This is the main condition for creating an efficient do-it-yourself cold-smoked box.

Roof

The upper part of the smoking installation, as a rule, is performed in a single-slope or dual-slope version. If you want your smoker to have a single-sided upper surface, then it must be done with a slope back, taking boards 4-5 cm long for this over size grounds. Whereas when choosing the second option for arranging the roof, you will need to assemble truss system with a slope length of 55-65 cm. The joints between the boards must be sealed.

If you want your smoker to stand permanently on the street, then the roof must be primed and painted with any oil paint. The upper part of the smoking structure, during its operation, does not overheat, so you should not worry that the paint may peel off, but from bad weather and high humidity painting will protect the installation in the best possible way.

A chimney is mounted in the upper part of the smokehouse, which is equipped with a damper and a scraper mechanism. It can be either wood or metal. This is necessary in order for the smokehouse to work as efficiently as possible, because due to the chimney, not only the smoke masses are removed, but also the internal temperature is adjusted.

Cabinet Assembly Instructions

So, the smoking mini-station is assembled in the following order:

  • assembly frame base;
  • bottom installation;
  • arrangement of the case with wooden canvases;
  • door manufacturing;
  • door hanging;
  • the device of the upper part of the structure;
  • installation of functional equipment - smoke generator, heating element, thermostat, chimney system.

VIDEO: How and from what to assemble a smoking cabinet

Detailed device

For the installation of a smokehouse, a vertical-type ejector smoke generator is used, which must be attached to the rear wall of the smoking structure. The smoke generator, in turn, is connected to the internal cavity through metal pipeØ2.5-4 cm.

In order to convert a cold-smoking cabinet into a hot-smoking apparatus, it should be equipped with a heating device, which, as a rule, uses low-power (no more than 1 kW) closed-type heating elements. The heating element is installed on the bottom of the unit. And in order to avoid igniting the bottom, the heating element is placed on a metal profile plate, which is located 50-100 mm above the bottom of the box. Thanks to the air gap and metal frame it is possible to remove part of the thermal energy, which eliminates the possibility of ignition.

A tray is installed on top of the heating element, which is designed to collect fat during smoking. Even a baking sheet is suitable as a pallet. The main condition is that it must be removable so that after each smoking session it can be removed and cleaned.

Thus, it is possible to protect the heating element from greasy drops.

You can immediately equip the device with a heating element, and if necessary, cold smoking, simply turn it off. So, thanks to one smoke generator, the temperature inside the smoking cabinet reaches 30-40 ° C.

Smoke generator connection

And if you want to smoke products in a hot way, then with the help of a heating element it is possible to reach a temperature of approximately 150 ° C. As for adjusting the temperature regime, a thermostat will help you with this, the sensor of which is located at the top of the smokehouse. It is also possible to equip the structure with a thermometer, which greatly simplifies the work with the smoking installation.

Heating element for hot smoking

Many craftsmen equip the oil burner with two handles located on the sides of the cabinet. This will allow, if necessary, to move the oil lamp from place to place.

Of course, you can buy a smoking cabinet, but at the same time you will have to spend an average of 3 to 10 thousand on such a unit, depending on the configuration. You will spend a minimum of financial resources and effort on assembling a homemade oil lamp.

VIDEO: How to assemble a smoke generator and smoking cabinet

A home-made smokehouse made of wood is a structure-chamber into which smoke is supplied for cooking meat, fish, poultry. In order for the construction result to be convenient in operation, reliable and meet the technological conditions for processing products, it is important to choose the right project and raw materials.

Wood is easy to process, making it possible for even inexperienced homeowners to assemble the structure. There are no strict requirements for the body of the smoke chamber regarding its size and shape; if desired, the surface can be decorated with carvings, the outer part can be tinted using safe impregnations.

A significant advantage of building do-it-yourself facilities for cold and hot smoking is a wide selection of basic materials, their affordable cost. Work can be organized using standard tools: screwdriver, screwdriver, hammer, hacksaw. The structure can subsequently be insulated to minimize heat loss, mineral wool and ecowool, felt, needles, sawdust, expanded clay, shavings are suitable here.

The disadvantage of the structure is sensitivity to high humidity, atmospheric manifestations, temperature extremes. It is necessary to carefully observe safety measures, negligent attitude to operation can cause a fire.

Features of project selection

First of all, you need to decide on the priority method of smoking:

  • the hot process speeds up the readiness of products, the delicacies have a noticeable smell of a fire, the smoke temperature here is 43-45 ° C;
  • cold smoking implies a long process, but such products can be stored longer, they have a more refined taste. In this case, the smoke is heated up to 19-25°C;
  • Baking in smoke is the processing of products at a temperature of 80-100°C.

The smokehouse can be portable and stationary, the second solution will be more reliable and easy to use, it is designed for long-term and intensive use. Compact structure can be placed on personal plot, in a garage or shed, although for safety reasons it is better to use it in the open.

The project of standard cold smoked houses includes the following components:

  • smoke cabinet - the most convenient option with parameters 90x60x120 cm;
  • two wooden or metal grates that fit exactly into the cooking chamber and a sheet steel pan for collecting fat;
  • wooden legs;
  • chimney - it can be made of metal or plastic pipe with a diameter of 5 cm;
  • inlet chimney - its cross section must be at least 10 cm, the optimal length is 3 m, it is advisable to use metal or ceramic variations, plastic will emit dangerous compounds when heated;
  • a brick or metal firebox, which is placed at a distance of 3 m from the smoke chamber;
  • roofing materials from which the roof is equipped - profiled sheet, roofing material, slate, metal tile.

Products are placed on the grates provided in the body, the stability of the structure as a whole is ensured by the legs. To track temperature regime inside the building, you need to hang a thermometer on the wall. The firebox and the chamber are combined with a chimney pipe, the roof is equipped with a chimney, the latter is covered with a piece of slate. If a rotating damper is provided on the outlet, it will be possible to adjust the traction force.

When drawing up a project, it is necessary to indicate on the drawing a plan for the location of the structure on the site, features of structural elements with dimensions. First of all, you need to choose the desired dimensions of the camera, while it is more convenient if its height does not exceed 120 cm.

The roof can be single-pitched and gable, flat, trapezoidal. The easiest way to make a flat-shaped roof, a sloping variation, which has an angle of 5-20 ° relative to the ground, will be a little more difficult. The outlet pipe can be mounted on any side of the roof - even on the left, even on the right.

The inlet into which the chimney pipe is inserted is provided either in the bottom of the chamber or in the lower segment of the wall. Choice of the most good option depends on how the firebox is connected to the smokehouse. If it is decided to lay a pipe with a deepening into the ground, the inlet should be at the bottom.

Only those breeds that are distinguished by an extremely low resin content are suitable for building a house:

  • cedar,
  • alder,
  • Birch,
  • Linden,
  • aspen.

When choosing materials, it is necessary to focus on the size and number of knots, since when heated, they will fall out, which will violate the integrity of the chamber.

The following forms of wood are commonly used:

  • planed boards;
  • bars of different sections;
  • plywood with a thickness of at least 8 mm;
  • lining;
  • block house.

It is forbidden to use laminated boards saturated with adhesives - chipboard, OSB, MDF. When heated, they will release toxic substances that are hazardous to health. Moisture and high temperatures will cause delamination of the sheets.

Wood needs to be pre-impregnated with an antiseptic, compositions such as Pirilax, Pinotex, Senezh Ecobio are suitable. To speed up the work, you need to arm yourself with a screwdriver and a jigsaw, you will also need a tape measure, a building level.

Stages of assembling and arranging a smokehouse with your own hands

It will be easiest for beginners to make a wooden smokehouse, the dimensions of which are 90x60x120 cm. Since the cooking process is long and accompanied by abundant smoke, you need to place the structure so that the owners and neighbors do not experience discomfort, that is, away from residential buildings and recreational areas.

A foundation is not needed if the soil is stable with deep groundwater, but in the case of a predominance of wet and loose soils, care will have to be taken to prepare the base. They dig a hole according to the size of the chamber to a depth of 40 cm, make a crushed stone pillow, and concrete blocks are laid on top. Mandatory manipulations - tying with wire and pouring cement mortar. The insulating material will help protect the foundation of the smoker from moisture.

Warm smoke tends to rise, so when designing a structure, you need to take into account the relief of the site. If you place the firebox a little lower down the slope, an effective chimney is formed from the pipe.

Fulfillment of the base

As a base for the frame, 4 pieces of timber 1.5 m long with a section of 5x5 cm are used, they form the vertical racks of the camera. The length of the bars is determined on the basis of the following calculation: 30 cm are laid on the legs, 120 cm is the directly useful height of the structure.


Vertical racks are complemented by horizontal crossbars from the same bars, you need 4 pieces of 60 cm and 4 pieces of 90 cm. Horizontal and vertical components are combined with self-tapping screws and metal corners.

Hull bookmark

The frame is sheathed with inside main material. Plywood, boards, lining are fixed on the base with the help of self-tapping screws or nails. Since the cross section of the frame beams is 5x5 cm, a free cavity 5 cm wide is formed between the two layers of sheathing (inner and outer). A heater is laid in it, it is better to give preference to mineral wool boards. Bulk thermal insulation materials, for example, sawdust or needles, are placed in the cavity after the formation of the outer lining.

It is important to prevent the spread of insulation particles, fibers so that they do not fall on food. Therefore, on inner lining on the side where the insulating material will be, attach food foil, carefully connecting the joints.

The final step to form the body of the smokehouse is to install the outer lining on top of the slab insulation.

Building a roof

Depending on which project formed the basis, they assemble a gable or shed roof, a flat solution is admissible. It is necessary to leave a hole through which the flue pipe will pass (in the upper part of the housing wall). After installing the pipe, carefully insulate the slots with heat-resistant sealant, tow, and mounting foam.

Roofing material is laid on the outer surface of the roof, for this you must first assemble the crate. Bars 3 by 4 cm or 2 by 4 cm are suitable here. This forms a mandatory ventilation gap, thanks to which the wood will not be waterlogged, which means that the risk of decay, mold and fungus will decrease.

Grids and tray

For the manufacture of gratings, you need to stock up on strong wooden slats, their dimensions can be 1x2 or 1x1.5 cm. The length of the blanks should be equal to the depth of the chamber - 60 cm. The slats are hammered together in increments of no more than 3-4 cm.

To collect the fat, a metal tray should be provided, since it is easier to care for it than a wooden one (including washing). Optimal material for its manufacture will be food grade stainless steel: a rectangular blank with dimensions of 55x85 cm is cut out of the plate using a grinder.


Food grade stainless steel - great option for making a pallet

An indent of 1 cm is left along the perimeter of the finished rectangle, it is advisable to draw these lines with a pencil. According to the markup, shallow cuts are made: for this, you need to install a thin disk for metal (no more than 1.5 mm) on the grinder. Files will help bend the stainless steel sheet so that the sides are formed. The corners of the product can be bolted or fixed by welding.

From metal panels, sheets and bricks near the chamber collect a firebox, optimal distance between them - 3 m. The chimney is walled into the furnace, moreover, its opposite end is connected to the smoking chamber. The height of skill will be the arrangement of a smokehouse and a small woodshed under one roof.

Operating rules

A wooden structure can be assembled anywhere on the site, but it is desirable to move it away from residential, utility and sanitary buildings. Even if the smoke box is removed from the firebox, it is necessary to follow the measures fire safety. It is important to control the strength of the flame and the intensity of smoldering chips, to monitor the temperature readings inside the smoke chamber.

What could be tastier than homemade smoked meats? Many craftsmen are interested in describing the principle of creating useful homemade products in the household.

Finished products are captured in the photo, cold smoked smokehouses can be made by hand. Products home cooking is a welcome meal.

Do-it-yourself design

Cold smoking is the processing of food with the help of smoke having a temperature of 32 degrees. The process must be organized correctly, so the master will need to figure out how to make a cold smoked smokehouse correctly. It is important not to make a mistake with the construction scheme.

It is necessary that the hot smoke becomes cold. To do this, use a tunnel that connects the firebox to the compartment where the products are placed. The length of the tunnel can vary between 2-7 m. This distance is taken into account to calculate the length of the chimney.

If the firebox is located at a distance of more than 7 m from the smokehouse, draft problems, as a rule, cannot be avoided.

How does the device work?

The principle of operation of a homemade smokehouse can be represented as follows. Food processing can take up to 3 days. The process can continue for several weeks.

The main thing is to ensure that the smoking process occurs evenly. Do not mix different types of food in the smoking chamber.

You have to cook food in one go. It is important to sort products by size.

More about the design of the smokehouse

To make a firebox, you need to dig a trench with dimensions of 50x50. These values ​​may be greater. Often the width with the depth of the pit is made meter.

The bottom of the firebox can be made of brick, and then covered with a tin sheet. Cook cement mortar not necessary. It is enough to compact the bricks close to each other. The sides are also trimmed with brick. Here, for masonry, you need a clay mortar.

When creating a drawing of a cold smoked smokehouse, it is necessary to take into account both the remoteness of individual parts of the structure and the dimensions of the materials.

A trench is specially dug under the chimney with a diameter of 25 cm. From above it must be covered with a sheet of iron. To prevent smoke from seeping in, sheet material covered with earth.

A filter is placed at the junction of the smokehouse with the chimney. As the main element, a metal mesh with small cells is taken. A dense material is placed on the grid. The filter protects finished products from soot.

It is important to make the smokehouse durable and reliable. In this case, the structure will stand stably and will not fall if someone accidentally touches it. At the top, the smokehouse is equipped with stainless steel rods.

The indicator of their thickness varies in the range from 8 to 10 mm. They are durable, and food prepared for smoking is hung on them. Usually food is hung on special hooks. An alternative replacement is a conventional grill.

The simplest scheme

A smokehouse is considered a budget option, allowing the master to save building materials and time spent on construction.

The chamber with products is 2 m away from the firebox. A metal barrel can serve as the basis for a smokehouse.

Note!

Stages of work

Having determined for yourself the size of the smokehouse, you can begin construction. First you need to dig a hole under the furnace chamber. Its bottom is covered with a tin sheet. Thanks to this, it is possible to ensure a more uniform smoldering of chips and sawdust.

The next stage of work is the device of the chimney. The dug trench needs to be covered from above. For this purpose, only non-combustible materials are suitable.

The pit can be covered with a sheet of slate. Top of the chimney is covered with soil to ensure tightness.

The smoking chamber is arranged in a barrel with a cut off bottom. A metal mesh is mounted below, on which burlap is placed. By combining these materials, the task of filtering out soot particles is effectively solved.

At the top of the barrel, a metal grate is bolted, stepping back from the edge of 20 cm. This option is optional, you can limit yourself to rods with hooks.

Note!

To fully understand all the nuances, you need to watch the corresponding video clip.

When cold smoking, food loses moisture gradually. During the drying process, the smoke penetrates deeper into the products. The result is meat and fish delicacies with a delicious taste.

When the carcass of an old animal is smoked, its meat will remain harsh. In order not to be disappointed, at first you need to be guided by recipes that have already been tested by many. Experimenting with flavors is best left for later.

In the finished factory-made smokehouse there are several grates and a tray. It is better to choose a product with a large capacity so that smoking is carried out more evenly.

For lovers of long hikes, you need a smokehouse made of metal with a thickness of 0.8 mm. In the country, you can install heavier options, where the thickness of the steel case is 2 mm.

Photo of a cold smoked smokehouse with your own hands

Note!

Smoked products not only have a pleasant aroma and taste, but also have a long shelf life. In mass nutrition, natural smoking is most often replaced by a liquid smoke processing process. Smoking cabinets are devices for cold and hot smoking. They allow you to make smoked delicacies from fish or meat at home. You just need to purchase the right equipment or make it yourself.

Types of smoking

The design of the smoking cabinet will largely depend on the specific purpose. this equipment. The device can have different operating modes depending on what temperature needs to be maintained inside the cabinet.

The smoking procedure is of three different types.

  • Hotter. The temperature of the smoke in this case should be at least seventy degrees. The maximum value can reach one hundred and twenty degrees. This procedure can take from fifteen minutes to four hours, depending on the size of the products.
  • Semi-hot. The temperature should be between sixty and seventy degrees. In this way, only very fresh semi-finished products can be processed.
  • Cold. The temperature of the smoke should not exceed fifty degrees. The minimum allowable temperature is thirty degrees. This procedure takes a long time, which can range from several hours to several days.

Specifications

Smoking equipment has a difference in design and some characteristics. The device of the smoking cabinet completely depends on what type of smoking it is intended for.

Instruments of all types should have three basic functions.

  • Ensure uniform heating of food. The temperature and smoke in the cabinet must evenly affect the semi-finished product. Otherwise, the taste of smoked meats will be spoiled.
  • The smoke in the chamber should be light.
  • The design must ensure gradual penetration of smoke into the products.

Cold

Low-temperature smoking equipment consists of the following main elements:

  • combustion chamber;
  • smoking cabinet;
  • chimney.

For the manufacture of fireboxes, bricks or metal are most often used. The design of the chamber should allow easy cleaning of the ash during the smoking process. Since a rather acrid dark smoke is emitted when kindling firewood, a smoke damper must be equipped in the firebox. She will direct the smoke into the chimney or take it out of the smoking cabinet to the outside.

Since the cold smoking process does not require high temperatures, the smoking cabinet can be made from the simplest materials, such as certain types of wood or stainless steel.

The only exceptions are materials with high porosity, since smoke and moisture will accumulate in the pores, which will lead to the formation of an unpleasant odor in the chamber.

The most convenient option would be a barrel made of wood or metal. A hole is made at the bottom of the product to ensure the penetration of smoke into the chamber. To place products in the smoking chamber inside the barrel, it is necessary to fix metal grates or hang hooks. Moistened burlap can be used as a cover.

A distinctive feature of the design of devices for cold smoking is a long chimney. For the manufacture of such a design, metal is best suited. However, it should be remembered that a metal chimney requires regular cleaning of soot. You can dig a chimney in the ground, then the soil will absorb condensate containing carcinogens.

hotter

Hot smoking takes place at fairly high temperatures. This temperature is achieved not by burning firewood, but by burning special wood chips. The smoking time depends on the size of the products, but in any case it is much shorter than the cold smoke processing time. The combustion chamber in hot processing devices must be located directly below the smoking chamber. The firebox can be built from gas burner for boilers or electric stoves.

The smoking chamber should be as airtight as possible, which will allow the semi-finished products to be evenly exposed to smoke.

The closing structure of the smoking chamber can be equipped with a water seal. It is a small indentation according to the size of the chamber and cover. Water is poured into the resulting tank. From above the structure is closed with a lid. This allows the formation of a barrier that protects the chamber from the entry of air from the outside and does not release smoke from the inside.

Hooks or grates for products are placed inside the smoking chamber. You can make a grill yourself or take a barbecue product. A mandatory element of the hot smoke chamber is a container for dripping fat and dripping juice from semi-finished products. The pallet should be easily removed from the equipment, as it must be periodically cleaned from accumulated contaminants.

Semi-hot

Devices for semi-hot smoking have the simplest design. Most often, this type of equipment is used for home processing of meat and fish products. It can be built from gas stove with a hood or from a steel box. The thickness of the walls of a stainless steel box should be at least one and a half millimeters, black steel - three millimeters.

The smoking box must be equipped with a lid, a container for collecting fat and food grates. Wood chips are poured onto the bottom of the cabinet, after which the product is installed above the fire. The chips smolder under the influence of high temperatures, forming smoke in the chamber. A small hole can be drilled on the lid of the product so that a small amount of smoke comes out when smoking.

How to make your own?

Making a smokehouse with your own hands for one or another method of processing meat and fish semi-finished products will not be particularly difficult. It is only important to know how the device works for a particular type of smoking. Ready-made instructions and equipment drawings can be easily found on the Internet.

A cold smoke treatment device is most often made from a wooden or metal barrel. Wood appliances are convenient in that they can be insulated from the inside, unlike metal products. Any material that does not emit toxic substances when heated can serve as a heater: cellulose wool, mineral wool, felt. Hot working structures are best made from stainless steel.

As an example, consider homemade design low-temperature cabinet from a barrel with a volume of 100-200 liters. The upper part of the tank is completely cut off, and a hole is made in the lower part for connecting the chimney. From the cut part of the barrel, you can make a pan for collecting fat. For semi-finished products in the chamber, it is necessary to make a lattice or hang hooks on rods from reinforcement.

The chamber cover is most optimally made of wood. From 5 to 10 holes are drilled in the product to release moisture. Instead of a wooden lid, you can use burlap. Before starting smoking, the material must be moistened with cold water and squeeze carefully.

How to make a smoke cabinet with your own hands, see the video below.

Smoked fish or meat are foods loved by many. Of course, this food is considered a gastronomic time bomb, as it is harmful in almost every sense. But from time to time to treat yourself to a smoked delicacy is not a sin.

Smoked beef, lard, and any kind of fish go well. To diversify your diet at a picnic, you can buy a ready-made dish at your own peril and risk, or you can cook this delicious treat yourself if you build a high-quality cold-smoked smokehouse with your own hands in your country house or backyard.

Types of smoking

What is smoking? This is a slow cooking process by exposing the raw product to the smoke that comes from smoldering wood. Thus, meat or fish is not overheated and is not exposed to open fire, and indeed high temperature. Many cooks believe that right choice smoldering wood species is extremely important for giving the dish a particular flavor.

In total, there are three options for cooking dishes in a smokehouse:

  • Hot is the most fast way prepare the product. Meat or fish without excess fat hung over a source of open fire, exposed to smoke heated to 80-140 degrees. The temperature depends on the type of product being cooked.
  • Semi-hot. In this variant, the smoke is cooled with a short pipe. In this case, the temperature of the smoke drops to 50-60 degrees. Cooking in this case takes about a day.
  • Cold is a variation of dried meat or fish. The raw product is cooked in smoke, which cools down to 15-40 degrees. In order to cool the stream of combustion waste to such a temperature, a special structure is constructed: a small trench is dug between the hung products and smoldering wood or a long pipe is laid. This method takes more time - at least several days, but the shelf life of the finished product increases significantly.

The smokehouse is designed not only for cooking meat or fish products, but also dairy products, as well as vegetables and fruits, which at the same time acquire new flavor notes. There are many ways to carry out the cooking process in a smokehouse.

The design of a typical smokehouse

Thus, the device of the smoking unit will also depend on the chosen method of preparing smoked meat or fish. If you want to do it, you can’t expect any difficulties - it’s quite possible to construct a decent smokehouse from any metal object at hand, even from an old rusty bucket. In the same case, if it is decided to cook the dish using the cold smoking method, building a smokehouse with your own hands will be somewhat more difficult. You will have to spend a little more time disassembling the device, planning and building the smokehouse itself. But this task is not impossible either.

Like any cooking appliance, cold type smokehouse can be made in two versions:

  • Stationary, in which it is imperative to build an efficient chimney of sufficient length, which will cool the smoke to the desired temperature. But it is not enough to move the cooked product away from the flame - you need to properly direct the smoke coming from the firewood, which will require good traction. Accordingly, the chimney must have sufficient height. The type of chimney can be anything: it can be built of brick, galvanized or stainless steel pipes - it all depends for the most part on aesthetic preferences. Do not use only asbestos and polymer chimneys, as they can impregnate food with toxic emissions.
  • Mobile option smoking unit does not require the construction of a chimney. In this case, a dug ditch of sufficient depth, width and slope will be involved in transporting the smoke.

Read also: How to make a smokehouse at home

Instead of a full-fledged heat source in the smokehouse, a simple smoke generator can be used, the use of which greatly simplifies the assembly of the smokehouse. You can fill this device with small wood fuel - chips or sawdust.

The simplest smoke generator is constructed from any steel container in the form of a cylinder - for example, a large thermos, from which the flask is removed and used as a simple oven.

To begin with, consider general principles do-it-yourself smokehouse construction, after which - the design features of a wooden smoking chamber.

Technology for designing a fixed smokehouse

In order to get a high-quality and durable cold-smoked smokehouse, which will stand motionless on suburban area, You will need very few materials: several sheets of slate, a durable brick, a chamber for the cooked dish (bucket, barrel or cistern, depending on the planned cooking volumes - the smokehouse can have a steel or wood container), as well as a metal grate.

The process of building a smokehouse with your own hands takes place in several stages:


Read also: Homemade smokehouse

If the place chosen for the construction of the smokehouse has damp or loose soil, a foundation should be made under the chamber. To do this, you need to dig a rectangular pit that matches the size of the structure. The depth of the pit should be at least 30 cm.

The structure of the foundation should be like this:
  • the bottom of the pit is covered with large gravel;
  • walls are formed from foam concrete blocks or monolithic concrete for which formwork needs to be built;
  • blocks are reinforced with a metal reinforcing mesh with large cells;
  • the rest of the volume is filled with cement-sand mortar, prepared with a ratio of cement to sand of 1:3.

If the soil is sufficiently reliable, and its erosion by groundwater or other waters is unlikely, you can not build a full-fledged foundation and get by with only a brick pedestal.

Designing a mobile smokehouse

To build a camping version of a smokehouse, you will need a sufficient amount of dense polyethylene film, as well as a lot of any available material at hand: fresh tree branches, good boards, twigs. Of course, a mobile smokehouse can only be built with your own hands.

The design of the smokehouse takes place in four simple steps:

  1. A suitable site is selected at the halt site: a gentle slope or shore of a reservoir. The side to which the surface of the earth is facing must be windward so that the smoke does not fly away where it should not. As in the stationary version, a straight ditch of the same size is dug - 3 m long, 50 cm deep, the width does not matter. The ditch may slope to the horizon, but the angle should not exceed 60 degrees.
  2. The ditch is covered with found branches and boards and sprinkled with earth and turf. A fire is made at the lower end of the ditch, and a smoking chamber is set up at the upper end.
  3. In this case, the assembly of a solid container for cold smoking is not required; an ordinary frame made of boards is suitable, which should be covered with polyethylene. An exhaust slot is cut from above.
  4. In the resulting improvised chamber, cooked meat and fish are hung. In order for the cooking process to start, the fire must be burned out, only heated embers should remain. After all the flames have disappeared, the pit is covered with a dense cloth, leaving a gap to provide traction. The width of this gap is selected so that the coals smolder well, but do not flare up.

Assembling a smoking chamber made of wood

So, a cold smoked smokehouse consists of three main elements: a heat source, a chimney and a smoking chamber. And if the first two elements in any unit are similar, then when building the third one, you can let your imagination run wild. good option Do-it-yourself wooden camera design will become, as it is quite simple, environmentally friendly and aesthetically attractive. With high-quality assembly and decent wood processing, such a smokehouse will last a very long time.