You will end up as hooked as I am.
Everyone had lots of smoked goodies in their Christmas hampers.
There is a brilliant book on all things smoking called Smoking Food at Home withSmoky Joe. It is totally user friendly, with lots of recipes and they have a website and will give you extra hints a tips. I bought lots of books on smoking before I began but this one is tops and my smoky bible.
I like to brusk salmon in whisky and use a sprinkling of this salmon cure which is from the book.
550g salt
100g soft brown sugar
and a pinch of salt petre. You don't have to use this but I got some from Amazon.
One of my favourite things to eat are smoked olives, roasted nuts that you toss in a little melted butter or oil and then in a mixture of 4 tabs sugar 1 tab of salt, just enough to flavour and then add chillies or star anise.
If you have a Turkish store near you that sells the pickled red bell peppers they are delicious smoked as are the pickled garlic. Smoke for between 3-6 hours.
Another of my all time favourites are sunblush tomatoes, either buy them or do your own in the oven before roasting. Halve tomatoes, sprinkle with a little olive oil, crushed garlic, salt, sugar and a drizzle of red wine vinegar and pop in a low oven for several hours until they are at the sunblush stage. It helps to disperse the moisture if you wedge your oven door open slightly with a wodge of tin foil. The smoke for between 2 to 4 hours.
CHeese is dead easy to smoke and absolutely delicious.
As long as you keep chicken and duck breasts below 20C for cold smoking you can then cook them off in the oven and they are delicious. There are good brine recipes in the book.
I smoked some butter and some double cream which I used to make a smoky chocolate icecream.
You can also brine mackeral, smoke it and then cook it in the oven or pan.
Which cold smoker did you get??