I have a Brinkman smoker with an off-set smoker box. Is that the sort of thing you had in mind by suggesting the smoke should move across the food but away from the heat source? No, that unit is a hot smoker (despite being able to run pretty cool). Cold smoking is done with smoke, period, with a temp around 90° . Picture a pit and a bit up hill from the pit is your smoke house. 10 feet or so. If you don't have a hill just elevate your smoking house...so long as you run the smoke uphill. This smoke house can be an actual shed, hut, house or it can be a cardboard box. I have a buddy who does it using two barrels. One for the fire and smoke generation, one to hang or rack product in, joined by a pipe. About 15 feet of pipe in his case. You light your fire in the pit and clamp it down, now the smoke runs through a pipe (I use diesel truck exhaust pipe, cheap at the junkyard...well cheap enough) to the hut, house, box, whatever you have your product in. By the time the smoke gets to the house it has cooled considerably and you truly are preserving with smoke. Most of the time we are cooking with smoke flavour added. Now, before everyone runs out and starts cold smoking, you have to be able to control and maintain a fire or you will soot up your smoke. Food smoking smoke should be white, with a light gray to it when you add a chunk. Black or dark gray smoke is bad. You have to be able to maintain a steady draft but not too strong or you will make your product bitter. You have to be very certain about your cure or you will die. Certainly you can poop funny for days. I've (mostly) got it down but I still mess up sometimes (too often, really) and ruin a batch. Its an art and it is based on trial and error, not recipes. Tell the truth I only cold smoke oysters, cheeses and salt with any regularity. Once a year we set up to do a big load of semi cured sausages but that is a real weekend of work. We try and do a years worth at that time because it is a real pain to get it done properly. I hot smoke my salmon, if I want a cold smoke type salmon I make gravlax.

I am much too late to be of any help to starlightfarm with her salmon dinner, but here is a really good recipe for a whole salmon. Salmon Baked in Foil Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune 1 whole salmon, 6-8 lb and cleaned 1 c sliced carrots 1 c sliced onion 1 c sliced celery ½ tsp fresh thyme Salt to taste 8 peppercorns, crushed 1 garlic clove, crushed 1 bay leaf 2 c dry white wine Preheat oven to 400F. Cover a baking sheet with foil. In bowl combine carrots, onion, celery, thyme, salt, peppercorns, garlic, bay leaf and wine. Place cleaned salmon in center of baking sheet, stuff with vegetable mixture and seal foil tightly around salmon. Bake 50-60 minutes or until salmon is opaque in thickest part. Remove from oven and cool. Once cool, remove skin from fish and serve warm or chilled with Hollandaise or your choice of sauce. Makes 8-10 servings. Linda

Linda, I've seen it and it's definitely not Milanese, but I don't know what the name is. Scott, I can't eat butter so I haven't tasted the herb butter you're describing. However I would imagine that there might be some garlic along with the dill. Hopefully someone else who's a Costco shopper will come along and describe it better.

Works well with chicken breast too....just cook it longer, about 18 to 20 minutes depending on size, and put your veggies in raw because of the longer cooking time. I also drizzle a little terayaki on the chicken so you don't have this white piece of chicken when you open it up. For veggies with chicken I like to include some onion rounds as well as green beans, carrot sticks and even a well drained slice of tomato. Your directions didn't say to brush the parchment with oil, before putting in the food. I always do that....don't know why if it's good and doesn't leak without. Linda C