Salting fish and drying it at home

One of the simplest and most common ways to process and store fish is salting.

Salt makes the fish practically inaccessible to bacteria due to the fact that during salting, excess moisture is extracted from the fish. The fish is saturated with table salt. Thus, the development of enzymatic processes is delayed.

However, in order to salt fish well and efficiently, you need to follow some recommendations for proper salting, which will be discussed in our review on the art of processing fish.

Dear friends, you might be interested to know that at home you can salt almost any fish and get a product of excellent quality.

However, it is recommended to salt sturgeon fish only with special refrigeration equipment and by specialists with professional skills.

The highest quality salted fish is obtained from species such as herring, mackerel, and salmon. Because all these types of fish are varieties that can “ripen” when salted.

For salting, you should always take freshly caught fish without damage, this guarantees a high-quality product.

What kind of fish can be salted and dried?

Absolutely any fish can be salted and dried, but it is generally accepted that the most delicious are fatty and medium-fat river fish. These types include:

Bream, white bream;
Roach, roach, ram;
Bluefish, peled;
Chekhon;
Catfish;
Flounder;
Smelt;
Capelin;
Ide, chub, asp and some others.

Low-fat fish can also be salted, but when dried it turns out dry. Such a fish is, for example, pike. Although, there will always be pike lovers.

Despite the sufficient fat content of fish such as carp, tench, crucian carp, they are not always suitable for salting and drying, since depending on the habitat, their meat may have a specific lake smell. However, river carp and crucian carp are almost free of this drawback, and salting fish with spices can make any fish tasty.

According to the time of catch, the fattest fish are those caught in the fall and early winter. In winter, the fish feeds poorly and loses excess fat, but during the diet its meat is cleaned, and therefore spring fish is also valued in its own way. The meat of fish caught in late winter and early spring is the cleanest, and after drying small fish it becomes translucent.

What about red fish? You can salt red fish in the same way as typical river fish. Any type of anadromous or local salmon is excellent for salting and drying.

Methods for salting fish

There are two main ways of salting fish for drying - “wet” and “dry” salting. Both methods make it possible to get equally tasty dried fish.

Dry salting is more often used for preparing large fish, and salting in brine is used for small and medium-sized fish. Another feature of salting fish in brine is that the meat of the finished fish is more tender.

For dry salting, you will need a container with holes or slits through which the juice released from the fish will drain (a wooden box, a plastic container with holes).

For salting fish in brine, any container with a salt-resistant coating (plastic, enamel dishes) is suitable. Aluminum containers for salting fish are not suitable, as their surface will oxidize and release impurities harmful to health.

Any salting method consists of the following steps:

Preparing fish for salting;
Salting fish;
Preparing fish for drying, soaking.

Let's look at each stage in more detail.

The best home-cured salmon fish

Salmon fish are better suited than any other for home salting in many ways according to various recipes.

But this does not mean at all that all salmon fish should be eaten only in salted form, for example, in the form of cold appetizers.

Often, salting large and medium-sized salmon fish is used to better preserve fish carcasses during long-term storage at home.

Subsequently, from home-salted fish with a high concentration of salt in the fish carcass after soaking, various hot culinary dishes of high quality are prepared in boiled, fried, baked, stuffed form. Open Recipes for pink salmon cutlets.

The best home-salted fish

The best home and commercial salted fish is obtained only from those representatives of cold-blooded fish that are capable of maturing. Carp, herring, salmon, and mackerel fish species are considered the best for salting.

And fish that is not capable of ripening, even after a long stay in brine, retains the taste and smell of raw fish product. It is recommended to immediately subject such fresh fish not to salting, but to thermal cooking.

The best small and medium-sized river fish for home salting are sabrefish, white-eye, bleak, roach, tench, bream, asp, ide, rudd, ram, and river perch.

With high-quality home salting, the fish loses up to a third of its tissue fluid, and the concentration of table salt in the fish carcass increases by 10-15%.

If you intend to use representatives of the seas and oceans for salting, then I recommend opening the topic Homemade salting of sea and river fish.

Preparing fish for salting

Fish selected for salting must be clean and exceptionally fresh. The fish is not of the first freshness, and as a result, it turns out to be smelly, or completely unsuitable for consumption.

Large and sometimes medium-sized fish are freed from their entrails. Very large fish are completely or half-spread. An incision is made from the back along the ridge and, less frequently, from the belly.

Salting fish

To dry-salt fish, you will need 1.5-2 kg of salt per 10 kg of fish, for salting in brine - 1-1.5 kg of salt per 10 kg of fish. The salt should be coarse; fine table salt is not at all suitable for salting fish. You can use regular table salt or sea salt.

When salting fish, you should be guided by the principle “it is better to over-salt than under-salt,” since excess salt will be removed during the soaking stage, and its deficiency can lead to accelerated growth of bacteria and spoilage of the fish.

The process of salting fish must take place in cool conditions, so the fish is put into a cellar or refrigerator for salting.

Salting time depends on the size of the fish. Small fish are salted in two days, medium - 2-4 days, large - up to a week. Fish kept in a strong salt solution in cool conditions can be stored in it for a month or more.

Spices

In 99% of cases, fish is salted without using any spices, but if you want to give the fish an unusual or spicy taste, they can be added during the salting process.

Regardless of the salting method, the following spices can be added to the fish:

Allspice peas;
Bay leaf;
Nutmeg;
Broken black pepper;
Coriander;
Carnation;
Ginger;
Cinnamon.

To these spices, you can add red capsicum, mustard seed, dill, cumin and anise - they all go well with fish, but any spices are good in moderation. To obtain a spicy salting, in addition to salt, you will need up to 50% sugar.

It should be borne in mind that spicy salting is best achieved when using medium-sized fish.

Dry pickling

Usually roach, gobies, and perch are prepared this way. They must be prepared in the same way as in the previous recipe - washed, gutted and salted, placing them in layers in the selected container. There is no need to use spices, but some people still add sugar or their favorite spices. After two, maximum three days, the fish carcasses are washed, wiped dry with cloth napkins and hung by the eyes or tail on a rope.

Advice. Experienced fishermen advise hanging the fish by the eyes - this way all the bad liquid will drain off easily. And if the fish hangs the other way around, with its tail up, then liquid with an unpleasant taste and smell will collect in its head.

You need to hang it tightly, but in such a way that air passes between the individual carcasses. Moreover, place the product not in the sun, but in the shade. For example, on a balcony or in a room where there is a constant draft. This way the catch will dry better and will not become damp later.

If the process occurs in the spring, when there are no flies, then you don’t need to do anything, just wait until the product is ready, but in the summer, the catch hung out for drying must be wrapped in gauze, folded in 3-5 layers, so that the flies do not get to it. If you don’t do this, then maggots will quickly appear in the fish, and it will be unsuitable for consumption. How long to dry the carcasses depends on the taste of the owners. Some people keep it like this for several days, others for half a day.

If you come across a large roach, perch, or goby (which, although rare, does happen), then it needs to be gutted and freed from the head. Then make several cuts along the back from the head to the tail and rub salt into them. Possibly with spices. After sprinkling the entire catch with salt, leave it for 8-10 days in a cool room. The brine that appears must be drained every day. After washing, when hanging out to dry, each individual is inserted into the abdomen with a wooden spacer (for example, toothpicks or twigs peeled from bark).

To salt fish you will need a press

If the whole process is carried out correctly, then the carcass will be similar in appearance to balyk, which is why this version of salting is popularly called “balykov”. The taste of the resulting product is very refined.

Small fish, such as roach, are even easier to salt since they do not need to be gutted. It is washed, salted, layered, and the container is placed in the refrigerator for 3, maximum 5 days. Then the product is washed and kept in clean water for an hour. After this, dry on paper towels and hang the carcasses on a thread or skewer. The catch is dried for 5 to 10 days - it all depends on the size of the roach and the air temperature outside or in the room where the product is dried.

Salting in brine

To salt fish in brine, you do not need to prepare a special brine; the juice released from the fish will be quite sufficient.

The bottom of the container in which the fish will be salted is sprinkled with a layer of salt;
The fish is placed sideways, in layers, each layer of fish is sprinkled with salt;
The top layer of fish is completely covered with salt, covered with a lid on which a small weight is placed.

The weight is necessary so that when the brine is released, all the fish are immersed in it.

Immediately after salting, the fish is put into a cellar or refrigerator and salted there for 2-8 days, depending on the size of the fish.

Salting small fish in brine

But you can also salt small fish in brine. To do this, dissolve 250-300 grams of salt in a liter of boiling water.

Then the fish, head to tail, are tightly placed in the dish, the top of the fish carcasses are filled with cooled brine and pressed under pressure. When salted in brine, small fish are usually ready for consumption within a day or two.

After salting is completed, the brine is drained. It is recommended to rinse the carcasses of salted fish in running (or replaceable) water and dry them.

It is recommended to store small home-salted fish in a cool place and eat it raw. But usually fishermen select small things from their catch, which are first salted and then dried.

My fish caught while fishing and dried, thanks to the active intervention of acquaintances and friends, is not stored for a long time.

Salting small and medium-sized fish during summer fishing

Dry salting of fish

Salting fish using the dry method is not much different from salting it in brine, but the salt consumption and salting time are a little more.

The bottom of a box or other container with holes is covered with canvas fabric (optional) and sprinkled with a layer of salt;
Each fish is completely rubbed with salt and laid back down with a tilt to one side, or simply sideways, each new layer of fish is sprinkled with salt;
The last layer of fish is generously sprinkled with salt, the fish is covered with a lid on which a small weight is placed.

After the fish is salted, the container with it is put away in a cool place - in the refrigerator or cellar, where it will remain for three to ten days, depending on the size of the fish.

Homemade salting of small fish

Home-made salting of small fish can be used both for preparing salty snacks for the upcoming holiday, and for quite long-term storage of salted fish.

At home, you can salt small fish, both river and sea fish. It is recommended to salt sea fish, such as capelin, sprat, sprat, anchovy, as a fish appetizer, in a marinade with spices.

For home salting of small fish, you should use a stainless steel container.

Large quantities of small fish are usually salted with spices in wooden barrels and kegs. Then ready-salted small fish are usually served as a spicy fish appetizer.

The salt concentration for moderate salting of a kilogram of small fish is 150 g. With strong salting, 250-300 g of salt are needed per kilogram of fish.

Small fish are salted without cutting. Before salting, fish carcasses are rinsed in water and allowed to drain. Then they are laid in rows sprinkled with salt (with spices).

An even circle is placed on top of the salted small fish and pressure is placed, which ensures that the fish is constantly immersed in the brine. After salting, while the fish is ripening, it is advisable to find it in a cool place at home.

The duration of home salting of small fish is 1-3 days and depends on the size of the carcasses, the salt concentration in the salting solution, the weight of the salted fish and the ambient temperature.

When salting small fish, it is recommended to add spices and vinegar to the brine. Then the result of home salting will be marinated fish.

Soaking the fish

After the fish has been completely salted, it is necessary to get rid of excess salt - this is done by soaking. If this is not done, the fish meat will be dry and over-salted, its surface will be covered with salt crystals, and the released fat will quickly oxidize, and the fish will “rust.”

Soaking fish after salting is a very important step, on which the taste and quality of dried fish depends.

Before soaking, the fish is washed to remove any remaining salt. The soaking process is carried out in cold water, the volume of which should be significantly larger than the fish. Ideal conditions are soaking in running water, but if this is not possible, the water is replaced several times with fresh water.

The same amount of time in hours is allotted for soaking as the number of days it was salted, but it makes no sense to soak for longer than 5-6 hours.

After soaking, the fish is completely ready for drying.

Drying fish

Many fishermen build a special drying cabinet on the balcony, which provides forced ventilation. But if there is no such device, the only way out is to hang the fish in any convenient place on ropes.

The place in which the fish is dried should be in the shade, preferably ventilated and cool.

The fish is suspended by the head or tail using hooks that can be made from paper clips or wire. If the fish is hung by the head, the fish meat will retain more fat; if by the tail, the risk of bile getting into the meat of ungutted fish is eliminated.

If the fish is suspended by the head, it is pierced with a hook in the jaw area or through the eyes. When suspended by the tail, it is pierced at the base of the caudal fin. Some anglers hang the fish by the tail using clothespins.

When hanging fish, you need to take into account that during drying, fat will drain and drip from it.

To protect against flies waiting for the moment when you hang the fish, it should be covered with gauze so that it does not touch the fish itself. It is best to hang fish for drying at night when there are no flies. During the night, the fish will become airy and will no longer attract insects as much.

You need to remove the fish without waiting for it to dry completely, especially if you are not going to eat it right away. During storage, the fish will quickly reach the desired degree of dryness.

How to properly prepare fish for salting

There are two types of carcass preparation.

For big fish. If the carcass is more than 30 cm in length, then it must be gutted. To do this, it is washed, the abdomen is ripped open and the entrails are removed. Then wash everything again in cool water. It is not recommended to cut off the head, but the gills must be removed.
For small fish. Small carcasses up to 30 cm practically do not need to be prepared. They can be salted ungutted. The only requirement is that the gills must be removed.

If the gills are left, the carcasses will begin to disappear due to the fact that harmful bacteria will begin to develop in them. Even a large amount of salt will not save you from this, because it does not completely disinfect them.

Storing dried fish

Any dried fish will dry out and become dried out over time, but this is not the only problem. When storing fish in conditions with access to light and air, salt is released on its surface, its fat oxidizes, the fish “rusts” and goes rancid. In conditions of high humidity, there is a risk of fish spoilage due to mold and the development of dangerous bacteria.

It is almost impossible to create ideal conditions for storing fish at home, but it is possible to preserve dried fish for a long time. For those who love dried fish, drying out is not a problem at all.

There are several types of storage of dried fish, each of which has its own pros and cons, and shelf life.

Package

Wooden boxes, corrugated cardboard boxes, wicker baskets, linen and multi-layer paper grocery bags, kraft paper laminated with polyethylene, etc. are used as packaging for storing dried fish.

Studies of different types of packaging have shown that polyethylene bags and aluminum foil laminated with polyethylene are unsuitable, while kraft paper with one-sided polyethylene coating passed the test.

Storing dried roach in laminated kraft bags at a temperature of about 0 degrees showed that the product, after 6 months, retains an attractive appearance, normal meat consistency, pleasant smell and taste.

Normal storage

The fish is stored at room temperature, in a corrugated cardboard box or paper packaging of several pieces. Without much damage to the properties of the fish, it can be stored for a week. If stored in this way for a longer period of time, the fish gradually dries out.

Longer storage is possible using a refrigerator. Humidity and temperature in the refrigerator compartment are optimal. The fish is packaged in paper bags of several pieces and can be stored in this form for up to a month.

Over time, the fish dries out and the fat oxidizes, so other methods are used for long-term storage.

How to salt fish for drying in brine.

Wash the fish and remove all the insides. There is no need to remove the scales.

Soak small portions in the salt solution for no more than 1 or 2 minutes. For this solution, 40 grams of salt are given per 1 liter of water.

Now, immediately immerse the fish in undiluted 9% vinegar for 2 minutes, then in a cooled saturated salt solution, but for 30 minutes.

Preparing a saturated saline solution is simple and easy. To do this, pour enough salt into the water so that the salt remains undissolved when stirred. Next, bring it to a boil and wait for it to cool.

After 30 minutes, simply remove the fish from the brine and hang it somewhere ventilated to dry. When it dries, a thin, white layer of salt will remain on its surface.

You can store such small salted fish in boxes with holes for air intake. Its storage time, if properly salted and preserved, can last several months.

Such tasty, salted and dried small fish, it doesn’t matter - river or sea, is exactly what goes best with beer or homemade kvass. Bon appetit!

See also video: Salting bleak in brine. As the author of the video, Alexey Dodonov, writes in the comments below, this recipe can be used for subsequent drying and drying of fish.

An alternative to dry salting: How to salt fish (Goby).

It is more pleasant to make any dish yourself than to buy it. This rule also applies to salting fish. Often when deciding to cook it yourself, the question arises of how to salt fish for drying correctly. Experienced chefs recommend using 5 basic recipes for salting.