smokin....

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JR.
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Re: smokin....

Post by JR. »

mediatechnology wrote:Check the product labels and avoid anything with Phosphates.
You meam like..... salt?

Sodium triphosphate (STP), also sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP), or tripolyphosphate (TPP),) is an inorganic compound with formula Na5P3O10. It is the sodium salt of the polyphosphate penta-anion, which is the conjugate base of triphosphoric acid.

The brine I soak the salmon in before smoking salmon uses lots of kosher salt, because traditionally salt is a meat preservative (extracting water suppresses bacteria growth).

Added salt also can increase the water weight... salt water (brine) is listed as an ingredient these days when I buy chicken at the market. I used to soak chicken in beer over night before barbecuing... now with all the added saltwater in there already there is no point in trying to hydrate the chicken further.

Back to frozen salmon... The label doesn't say how much STPP is in there only that it's added to retain moisture (read weigh more). I will see if i can taste it over the very salty (and sweet) brine I will soak it in over night, before drying and then smoking.

I checked the top google hits on STPP and there were some hysterical nerve toxin claims, and (incorrect) claims like albumin leakage is caused by STPP :roll: (Phosphates can affect the protein matrix in cheeses, but AFAIK albumin leakage in salmon is a natural consequence of cooking).

In excess STPP reportedly tastes nasty... I will be on the look out for off-flavors but i would be more nervous about the faux-fresh "never frozen" salmon (from chile) being over dosed with STPP than hard frozen AK salmon, even after a round trip to China for processing.

Thanks for the heads up...

JR
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Re: smokin....

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Sodium triphosphate (STP), also sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP), or tripolyphosphate (TPP)
Yes. Destroys texture.
Very nasty stuff that causes intestinal cramping in some people.

Gave up Schwan's because of it.
Every protein they sold had Phosphates.

A lot of frozen fish is chock-full of it.
Shrimp treated with it is horrible.
Lots of Pork products have it.
Some Bar-B-Que brines.
Even salad dressings.

If you compare really clean chicken to the Phosphate-laced crap in the stores, one tastes like chicken from the 1960s the other like soap.

We get our chicken from Fran's through a local market: http://www.fransfryers.com/
Our beef and pork here: http://rudolphsmarket.com/
And sometimes our seafood here: http://www.rexsseafood.com/index.html
I get eggs about a mile away from here that are straight out of the hen.

The meats from Rudolphs are about twice what you'd pay in the store but in the case of the beef and pork you eat about half as much because its so rich and flavorful.

If I see any form of Sodium Phosphate on the label I just don't buy it.

I also avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup.
If I drink a single Jumex "fruit juice" I get wired for hours.
I think its messed a lot of people up.
Wouldn't be surprised if it ultimately winds up being the root cause of ADD.
Virtually every single food that goes into a kid is full of it.

Dough conditioner is breads is also awful.
There is a fairly well-known "Panera Bread Effect."
Panera has finally begun to pull out additives but I still won't eat there.

Needless to say we don't eat fast food or in any chain restaurants and pick the local non-franchised ones we do frequent very carefully.
We're seeing more than a few restaurants in our area making just about everything from scratch.

If you have NetFlix watch Morgan Spurlock's "Super Size Me."
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Re: smokin....

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mediatechnology wrote:
Sodium triphosphate (STP), also sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP), or tripolyphosphate (TPP)
Yes. Destroys texture.
Very nasty stuff that causes intestinal cramping in some people.

Gave up Schwan's because of it.
Every protein they sold had Phosphates.

A lot of frozen fish is chock-full of it.
Shrimp treated with it is horrible.
Lots of Pork products have it.
Some Bar-B-Que brines.
Even salad dressings.

If you compare really clean chicken to the Phosphate-laced crap in the stores, one tastes like chicken from the 1960s the other like soap.

We get our chicken from Fran's through a local market: http://www.fransfryers.com/
Our beef and pork here: http://rudolphsmarket.com/
And sometimes our seafood here: http://www.rexsseafood.com/index.html
I get eggs about a mile away from here that are straight out of the hen.
When I was a kid I had to feed the chickens and collect eggs from the hen house before going to school. These days I don't eat any eggs.
The meats from Rudolphs are about twice what you'd pay in the store but in the case of the beef and pork you eat about half as much because its so rich and flavorful.

If I see any form of Sodium Phosphate on the label I just don't buy it.
It looks like my old canned salmon :( has no "added" phosphates (some phosphates occur naturally in foods like salmon).

I need to revisit the other food market (also 10 miles away) to check the label on their brand of frozen salmon for added phosphates. I'll do that next week.

Apparently one tell for excessive added phosphate is how much water is released during cooking. Phosphates are used to improve appearance (retaining water on skin surface) but also to bump up the product weight by holding extra water.

If the other store's frozen salmon brand also adds phosphates I may perform an experiment comparing the before after weight of similar sized portions from each brand after pan cooking. Might as well do a taste test too. :D If both use phosphates but one is releasing more water that suggests which one is less desirable. :roll: Since I bought 4# I can hold back one small portion for this future experiment. I only need 3# for the recipe.
I also avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup.
If I drink a single Jumex "fruit juice" I get wired for hours.
I think its messed a lot of people up.
Wouldn't be surprised if it ultimately winds up being the root cause of ADD.
Virtually every single food that goes into a kid is full of it.

Dough conditioner is breads is also awful.
There is a fairly well-known "Panera Bread Effect."
Panera has finally begun to pull out additives but I still won't eat there.

Needless to say we don't eat fast food or in any chain restaurants and pick the local non-franchised ones we do frequent very carefully.
We're seeing more than a few restaurants in our area making just about everything from scratch.
I extremely rarely ever eat something that I did not cook from scratch myself. Last meal I did not prepare myself was several months ago when I ate a subway sandwich (no i don't even remember what kind of sandwich).
If you have NetFlix watch Morgan Spurlock's "Super Size Me."
No netflix, but I have long avoided highly processed fast foods. I don't know about ADD, but type II diabetes is surely related to energy balance issues from too much high calorie fast food, too easily available.

JR
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Re: smokin....

Post by mediatechnology »

Canned Salmon has never bothered me.
I think they don't need to add phosphates since its cooked, canned and doesn't have water loss from freezer burn.

IMHO our use of Schwan's products caused a Phosphate intolerance we might not have otherwise had.

BTW the meats at Rudolphs are old school dry-aged.
The fat content is high and is almost like pure butterfat.

I have had some wet-aged beef using phosphates that was a gut bomb.

There is occasionally wet-aged frozen beef available using Papain.
When I was able to get it it was quite good.

I recall that Phosphate-laced Salmon did release more albumin but likely because it retained more moisture.
Phosphate-laced beef exudes this pinkish-looking albumin goo you don't see normal beef release.

Finding corned beef that isn't full of phosphate brine is nearly impossible.
Phosphate-free ham is hard but the local grocery stores are starting to sell uncured sliced ham and bacon.

I think Super Size Me is on YouTube.
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Re: smokin....

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mediatechnology wrote:Canned Salmon has never bothered me.
I think they don't need to add phosphates since its cooked, canned and doesn't have water loss from freezer burn.
yes, but after comparing canned to smoked salmon, the canned stuff smells a little fishy to me. "Best by" date on a can in my cupboard says 7/20 so four years from now. :lol:
IMHO our use of Schwan's products caused a Phosphate intolerance we might not have otherwise had.
perhaps.... In researching this excessive phosphates can cause kidney(?) damage, and apparently seafood with heavy phosphate doses can kill snakes... (I didn't know snakes like sea food? but a snake lovers forum warned against feeding them seafood dosed with polyphosphates and shared anecdotes about dead snakes from that.)

Apparently space travel (like to the moon, can cause heart disease from higher cosmic radiation). I know off-topic. :lol:
BTW the meats at Rudolphs are old school dry-aged.
The fat content is high and is almost like pure butterfat.
I routinely buy beef that is marked down because it has been sitting a little long in the cooler... aged and cheaper. :lol: Note: don't try that with never frozen fish. :oops: Aged beef is more desirable because it has less water content. I guess my marked down beef is wet aged, because it is wrapped in plastic. (kidding, not vacuum packed)
I have had some wet-aged beef using phosphates that was a gut bomb.

There is occasionally wet-aged frozen beef available using Papain.
When I was able to get it it was quite good.

I recall that Phosphate-laced Salmon did release more albumin but likely because it retained more moisture.
Phosphate-laced beef exudes this pinkish-looking albumin goo you don't see normal beef release.
Phosphate can affect the protein matrix (loosening it up), while collecting too much water can affect the texture of fish. I've learned more than I want to know about this from scientific papers. Using it as an additive was first patented in the 60's. It can be abused to plump up older low quality fish that have lost water from delay in processing, and to add weight to all fish. No good standard for how to measure how much is too much. Scientific experiments cook it in microwave to measure water loss. 8-) I feel an experiment coming on. I am still a few days away from smoking this batch of salmon. I bought 4# but only need 3#, If I buy another 2# package I can divided that into two 3# batches.

I really need to find out more about the details of china processing. I think the other frozen salmon brand said product of china too. :o
Finding corned beef that isn't full of phosphate brine is nearly impossible.
Phosphate-free ham is hard but the local grocery stores are starting to sell uncured sliced ham and bacon.

I think Super Size Me is on YouTube.
I ignored it when it first came out and didn't much care for the premise. While the public has notoriously bad judgement about many decisions (including elections), I don't endorse suing the food industry or taxing calories. (IIRC Mexico just started taxing sugar in soda, Bloomberg in NYC was playing games with soda cup size.)

Eating 5,000 Kcal a day of any food is unhealthy, roughly 2x normal daily energy requirement. I'm shocked that Spurlock gained weight and suffered from negative blood chemistry effects. :roll: He did get his 15 seconds of fame.

JR
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Re: smokin....

Post by mediatechnology »

I think the other frozen salmon brand said product of china too.
They address that pointing out that the regulations have to say that the country that processes the fish becomes the country of origin.
So if its Alaskan Salmon shipped whole to China for processing it becomes Chinese Salmon.
Still when I see China on the label its a big red flag.

I think most of the beef you buy in the grocery store isn't aged at all.
The wet aged is the stuff you buy frozen in plastic or what you get at Applebee's, Outback or Chili's.

Outback does make some items from scratch.
Almost everything at an Applebees or Chilis comes out of a pouch and is microwaved.

We do have an In and Out Burger about 10 miles from here.
Their stuff is really fresh - the beef is not frozen and locally-sourced.
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Re: smokin....

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I love the WWW but my head hurts because i kept searching for info several more hours.
mediatechnology wrote:
I think the other frozen salmon brand said product of china too.
They address that pointing out that the regulations have to say that the country that processes the fish becomes the country of origin.
So if its Alaskan Salmon shipped whole to China for processing it becomes Chinese Salmon.
Still when I see China on the label its a big red flag.
It appears salmon has the head removed and is gutted before hard freezing and shipping to China to be deboned and filleted. So it appears exposure to polyphosphates is in the China part of the process. [edit] or could be dosed 2x [/edit]
I think most of the beef you buy in the grocery store isn't aged at all.
at least a few days before they mark down the price. :lol:

Wet aged beef is vacuum wrapped in plastic while in transit between the slaughter house and meat processor (something like 4 days).
The wet aged is the stuff you buy frozen in plastic or what you get at Applebee's, Outback or Chili's.

Outback does make some items from scratch.
Almost everything at an Applebees or Chilis comes out of a pouch and is microwaved.

We do have an In and Out Burger about 10 miles from here.
Their stuff is really fresh - the beef is not frozen and locally-sourced.
Some of the TMI I learned this afternoon.

#1 China is the largest fish processor/consumer in the world. :D

#2 Increasing wealth in China means they are increasing Chinese consumption of fish shipped there for processing :? Less fish shipped there is leaving.

#3 Increasing wages in China may tilt back toward domestic processing of domestic salmon being economic. :D

#4 EU is stricter than US about regulating Phosphates. :oops:

#5 The Chinese (cheaters) are already looking at substitutes for phosphates to bulk up fish that can't be detected by current testing. :roll:

#6 They don't even have firm numbers for how much fish they process because of the fudge factor caused by variable water retention.

#7 did I mention my head hurts. :lol:

Chinese when ordering fish in restaurants pick a live fish from a tank full of live fish swimming around and watch it butchered in front of them... I saw this in Hong Kong years ago. I suspect a nation that eats that much fish is suspicious about whether it is fresh, for a good reason.

I am a little optimistic about this... I suspect some production may shift back to AK. Future will be better if i live long enough.

JR

PS: Some concerns about a proposed gold mine in AK that could damage the AK wild salmon fishery. The US already killed off a major wild salmon fishery in lower continental states by building damns in WA state for hydroelectric power back in the 60s. Also fears of farmed salmon escaping and crossbreeding with wild salmon.
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Re: smokin....

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Today I smoked up another 3# of salmon to make 3+ weeks of frozen lunch meals.

One observation the 3# of smoked salmon seems like more fish than the 3# of canned salmon. Not sure what that means.

Again I had too much albumin (the protein ooze). I tried to keep the smoking temp lower but once again I had a spike-overshoot of the temperature.... This time 25'-30' too hot. Since smoking fish is not an exothermic reaction I was at a loss, but i think I now have it figured out... I use some wood chips to make the smoke, and my suspicion now is that the wood chips caught fire and generated more heat than smoke. :roll: :roll:

I will manage this better next time... obviously less wood chips at a time.

From doing some more research on Albumin formation, apparently any temperature hotter than 43'C (109'F) pumps congealed protein out to the surface. So I need to try even lower temperature. Safety is not an issue since brining the salmon in saltwater acts as a preservative, and after smoking, I scrape off the skin, shred the meat, and re-cook it in the slow cooker for another hour + so it reaches a safe terminal temperature (160'F+).

I still have a pound of frozen salmon in the ice box and tomorrow I can buy another 2# package of that other brand to do my polyphosphate comparison. I think I'll brine them both exactly the same, and then try smoking them at 105' for 4 hours, with less wood chips so the temperature stays low. :lol:

This is a lot more work than just opening a few cans of salmon, but so far worth the extra work. I can imagine not smoking and just cooking the salmon in the slow cooker, but still working on my smoking chops.

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Re: smokin....

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I bought 2# of the other brand frozen salmon to do a comparison experiment, and with the 1# left over from last time will have around 3# for next lunch batch.

It shows STPP on the ingredient label. This is similar fish, caught wild in AK and processed in China. This second brand has the skin removed too which is a little easier for me.

I have one small fillet from each batch defrosting in the same beer brine (beer with kosher salt and brown sugar). I will brine it for about a day and a half... just brining/defrosting over night in the fridge can leave fish still frozen.

Tonight I will rinse it off and let them dry over night (goal is to form a pellicle or dry surface layer on outside).

Tomorrow I will hit the smoker at new lower temp (105'-110'), and use less wood chips to prevent temperature flare ups.

This is not a perfect experiment but I'll see what I see... The non walmart fish was 15% more expensive. Since one has skin removed it will be easy to tell them apart. I expect both to make less albumin than the last time at a lower smoking temp. I'll still need to heat/cook after smoking to reach safe internal temp (hard to reach 140' internal temp in a 105' smoker). :oops:

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Re: smokin....

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After brining the fillets look quite different (walmart looks better).

Still suffering temp overshoots (130' with thermostat set for 105') Apparently 1500W is more power than I need for 105' so now I am turning down the hot plate so when it's on it doesn't get too hot and store up heat adding to the over shoot.

Even a little batch of wood chips smoking throws off heat too.

For this less insulation would be better...

JR
[update] turning down the hot plate which has it's own thermostat definitely slows down the rate of climb and should reduce over shoot, but I still see 110' with 105' target temp (heat control turns on at 103' off at 106'). Apparently it doesn't take much heat from smoldering wood chips to increase temps when loss to ambient is so small. Today is cool for august so normal temps would make this even harder. but i have a much better handle on it now. [/update]
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