Food smoking was invented as the process of preserving food to avoid food shortages. The process of food smoking is as old as the invention of fire for cooking.
Early man relied on food smoking to preserve food for sustenance during drought, epidemic, and cold weather seasons. The smoke coming out of the fire during cooking is curing the meat by altering its chemical composition. This helps to increase the shelf life of the meat.
Benefits of food smoking
Besides preserving food for a longer time, food smoking became a popular method of cooking for other benefits too. Since ancient times people cooked food in smoke for several other reasons also.
Here are the key benefits of the art of food smoking:
Enhanced flavor: Smoking imparts a unique smoky flavor to the food. This enhanced flavor increases the taste and aroma of the food making it more delicious than the normal method of cooking.
Better food texture: Food smoking also enhances the color and texture of the food after cooking. It gives a good charred brown color to the meat making it tender and succulent.
Decreased rate of food poisoning: As food smoking alters the chemical composition in the food, it creates unfavorable conditions for bacterial growth. This lowers the rate of food positioning, preserving its quality for a longer period.
Increased shelf life: This goes unsaid that food smoking helps to increase the shelf life of almost every food. As smoking reduces bacterial growth, it helps to prevent contamination of the food when stored for a longer time.
The ancient method of smoking
As we have already mentioned, food smoking is an age-old method of cooking. Food was smoked in a different way. Smoke houses played an important role. Generally, a community or a large group of people use to construct one smoke house for smoking a large amount of food. These smoke houses were constructed far away from the residential areas and were kept locked to prevent the entry of stray animals or any human.
A concrete structure was created with a chimney to vent out the smoke and an inner chamber to generate smoke from the fire. The smoke house also has a separate fuel chamber to store firewood or charcoal for uninterrupted smoking for long hours.
Evolution of food smoking
Food smoking has witnessed a sea of changes over the last hundred years. Community smoking is largely history now. Huge smokehouses have been replaced by a compact personal food smoker or a small improvised smokehouse in the backyard.
Now food smoking is a popular method of cooking for its unique smoky flavor and not just for preserving food. Smoked food has a loyal fan base for a number of reasons.
Respite during summer: Summers make cooking a real challenge. Food smoking comes to the rescue here. All you need to do is to set the food smoker to smoke the food while you enjoy your time with family. Smoked foods are a sure crowd-pleaser too.
Secrets of a Pro Food Smoker
The art of food smoking can be mastered with practice but a quality food smoker can take you a long way. A good food smoker can work self-sufficiently without any babysitting.
With advanced temperature controls and user-friendly features, a superior food smoker can give you a wonderful smoking experience. Not all food smokers are equipped with all the advanced features. Luckily we have Bradley Smokers that stand out from the crowd with all the features you need and the quality you want from a food smoker.
Here are the key features of Bradley Smoker that makes it a class apart from the others:
Auto fuel feed: Bradley smoker can automatically feed the fuel to help it work consistently for up to 10 hours. All you need to do is to fill the fuel tray and relax while the smoker does its job to perfection.
Multiple heating elements: Bradley smoker comes with 4 different heating elements to function as a hot smoker, cold smoker, oven, and dehydrator. Basically, one smoker can cater to all types of cooking requirements.
Digital interface: All the models of Bradley smoker are equipped with digital temperature controls and a timer. You can preset the desired temperature and time for each recipe.
Bradley Bisquettes: Bradley smokers operate with all types of wood chips or lumps but perform best with Bradley Bisquettes. These Bisquettes are specially designed wood chips that burn for a longer period and come in 17 different flavors like hickory, maple, cherry, whiskey, apple, etc.
Steamer: Bradley smoker has a separate water tray that can simultaneously steam the food while it is smoking. This prevents the food from drying out giving you tender and succulent meat, fish, and poultry.
User-friendly design: All Bradley smokers have magnetic doors to prevent excess loss of smoke to ensure faster cooking. These smokers have an insulated steel body for enhanced user-safety and ease of cleaning.
Here we shared with you all about the history of the art of food smoking and its evolution. We hope these simple Bradley tips & tricks have helped you to get a basic idea about modern food smoking and ways to ace it easily.
For more great ideas on how to get the most of your Bradley Smoker, check out the awesome articles on our Bradley Smoker Food Smoking Blog for more tips & tricks.
