Smoking meat is exactly what the name implies: flavoring meat with smoke. Anyway you can and using any kind of improvised device  will do a splendid job as long as your creation is made from environmentally safe material. As long as smoke contacts the meat surface it will impart its flavor and the strength of the flavor depends mainly on the time and density of the smoke. It helps if the smokehouse is tight but the meat will develop a smoky, though less pronounced flavor, even when smoked on an open fire. Wood chips may be added to hot coals during barbecuing and the meat will acquire a smoky flavor as well although it is not really smoked. The best definition is that barbecuing is cooking with smoke but it can not be considered smoking as we like to think of it.  The temperature range of 200° –300° F (93° - 150° C) is still too high to smoke meats since the fat that binds meat in sausages will melt away and the final product might taste like bread crumbs.

Smoking is what it says: smoking meats with smoke that may or may not be followed by cooking. Some products are only smoked at low temperatures and never cooked, yet are safe to eat. The dry sausage has an almost indefinite shelf life and yet this sausage is not cooked. Generally we may say that smoking in most cases consists of two steps:

The fact that the meat has been smoked does not make it safe to eat . Sausages, hams and other smoked meats are considered a raw product unless heated to an internal temperature of 154° F (68° C) and it is of no importance whether it is done by boiling, steaming, grilling, or baking. A sausage smoked at 100° F for 4 hrs, will have a great smoky taste, flavor and color but it will still be a raw sausage like a fresh sausage that was only ground, mixed with spices, and stuffed into a casing. Both of them must be cooked to safe temperatures before consumption. The exceptions to this rule are traditionally fermented dry sausages which may be only smoked or dried without cooking. After smoking is done we increase the temperature to about 170°F (76º C) to start cooking. We want to cook meats or sausages to 154-160 F° (68° - 72° C) internal temperature and here the quality and insulation of the smoker plays an important role. Nevertheless the main smoking process is performed below 140° F (60° C) as meat proteins become cooked at about 131° F (55° C) and higher. Prolonged smoking above this temperature will harden the outside surface area and will prematurely dry out the meat.

Well, by now you realize how simple making smoked products can be. It has nothing to do with the looks of a smokehouse. The smokehouse is a tool, like a knife, grinder or a stuffer. The tool does not make a quality product - YOU DO! And making quality products depends on meat selection, curing, smoking and cooking temperatures etc. Grinding partially frozen meat in a hand cranked grinder will make a better sausage than grinding warm meat in an expensive commercial machine. Almost any smokehouse will do for home production. If you see smoke sipping through your cardboard  box, you are smoking meat, that simple. It does not have to be perfectly tight if the cooking process will be performed somewhere else. Commercial manufacturers make thousands of pounds of product an hour and they work by different rules to be cost effective. They have to produce a constant quality product that will be accepted every day by the supermarkets. They need fancy computerized equipment which costs millions of dollars. A hobbyist is not bound by those rules as he has plenty of time to watch smoke going out of his paper box smoker.

To make our point that great products can be made under hostile climatic conditions using very simple smokehouses please check the photos below:

Smokehouse made out of a stump of an empty oak tree. It's been in operation for 20 years.	Firebox connected with a smoker by the in the ground trench. On the right of a stump lies a potato burlap sack used to cover the smoker.	Freshly caught fish from the fish farm located next door. The fish is caught, smoked and eaten  the same day.	Smoked fish is sold in a next door restaurant which is visited by German tourists. Above photos courtesy Poliwoda Fishing Grounds, Opole, Poland
Drum smoker. Smoke sticks lying on top. Burlap sack will be placed on top.	Drum smoker connected to a fire pit by a trench (covered with plywood). Blanket on top of a smoker.	Plywood cover upright, there is visible fire in a fire pit.	Wire hanger used for hooks. Drum smoker photos courtesy Szunaj

The next group of photos come courtesy Waldemar Kozik, who smokes meats, sausages, poultry and fish in the Catskill Mountains of New York. They are placed on this page to further illustrate the point that quality products can be made under any conditions using makeshift equipment. It is not the equipment that makes quality products, it is the technical know-how.

the smokehouse with a separate fire pit	The Master himself, Waldemar Kozik of Brooklyn, New York	a new load going in	inside view
bacons, loins, butts	sample of products	salmon fillets	it helps to catch a big one
smoking continues 24 hours	so is cooking	also at night	but it takes a lot of wood
in the spring, summer, fall and winter	to cook	day and night	on the fire
Zack provides security	Master and apprentice	what a place	even mushrooms are happy

It is hoped that the information presented here will undermine the common misconception that  fancy equipment is needed to create great meat products. We have been smoking meats for thousands of years without sophisticated tools, haven't we? If Waldemar Kozik can produce such great meats in the wilderness, imagine what can you do behind your house. By all means buy good equipment if you can afford it, but never forget that it is you and not your tools that will make or break the product.

Smokehouse Plans