It is clear that smoking improves the taste of any product and doubles its shelf life. Absolutely unique product- smoked fish, the benefits and harms of which lie on different sides of the scale, and which one outweighs one can only guess. To enlighten the respected reader on this controversial issue, this objective article was written.
Harm of aromatic smoked fish: how big is it?
Someone said that smoked meats only cause harm, is that true? True, but partly. If consumed this product in moderation and irregularly, then there will be no harm from it. Essentially, smoked fish is a delicacy, hence it is not eaten every day. These foods are intended for infrequent consumption. And not at all because they are expensive, but the whole point is that they are harmful. With excessive consumption of such food, the body receives an excessive amount of carcinogens, and where there are carcinogens, there are cancers.
Hot smoked products have an increased content of harmful carcinogens, since heat smoke allows them to penetrate tissue faster. By the way, industrially smoked fish is less harmful than that smoked by folk craftsmen over a regular fire, but only if it is made in accordance with all GOST standards. Nowadays, with increasing popularity and demand, this statement takes on the opposite meaning. Even nutritionists agree that a product prepared with a harmful “solution” should not be consumed in the diet. Smoking liquid smoke- a completely different technology, and a product obtained by immersion salted fish into this liquid is dangerous, and its taste characteristics are somewhat worse than those of the natural product.
The harm of smoked fish is obvious, but is it really that bad? After all specified product in itself a nutritious and biologically valuable product. There is so much useful stuff in it: easily digestible protein, a set of vitamins, the famous polyunsaturated fatty acids, and the content of calcium, fluorine and phosphorus is enviable. You just don’t need to include smoked meats in your daily diet, because there are enough types and recipes for it culinary processing. Remember, you need to eat fish.
Does smoke kill pathogenic microflora and helminths?
But helminths bravely and courageously endure both bad salting and smoking. True, they live in such a product for a relatively short time - only a few days. From this we can conclude that all the shortcomings of salting will be corrected by smoking, you just need to wait a while, and the dish will become completely safe, with regard to helminthiasis, of course.
Which smoked fish is healthier?
Undoubtedly, hot-cooked smoked fish is healthier and more harmful, as mentioned above. It is clear that with the cold method there is absolutely no heating of the product. It's just filled with smoke, no useful material are not destroyed, protein compounds do not coagulate, and fats do not melt. All components are preserved in their original, unchanged form, only sodium chloride is added - ordinary salt. But you can’t do without it for reasons of microbiological safety.
The benefits of such a product
There is a benefit, and what a benefit! After all, the fish remained a fish. No one fried it, stewed it or boiled it. She didn't lose hers useful properties due to severe heat treatment. and the implementation time has also increased. Smoked fish falls into the category of “cut and eat” products, and you don’t need to defrost it, and then also think about what to cook from it. In general, the benefit of smoked fish lies in the fact that it is just fish, and not dubious canned food in tin cans and not an oil-soaked culinary masterpiece.
I have already mentioned the principle “if you can’t, but really want to, then you can.” This happens all the time in life, when a person chooses what to eat. Patients with ulcers eat smoked and spicy foods (by the way, not everything spicy is harmful for this disease!), allergy sufferers eat liters of raspberries and eat handfuls of antihistamines, the detection of high cholesterol increases the craving for jellied meat and brisket. And this despite the fact that we have already celebrated the rehabilitation of cholesterol, once branded as the enemy of the people of the body.
There are two extremes in the approach to right and wrong food: eat everything you want and like - on the one hand, eat only healthy food with another. Both, of course, are wrong: the first will make itself known quickly enough with increased spending on doctors and medicines, the second will force you to stretch your legs, since for human body only slightly useful salty water and not a large number of fiber. Yes, you won’t believe it, everything else is harmful to one degree or another for one or another organ. Not our methods, right?
So, we decided that we would stick to the golden mean. But to do this you need to know where she is. For example, smoked fish or chicken. Can I eat it? What will this entail? How much can you eat without any problems? How to choose or prepare?
A small historical digression. Since ancient times, the smoking process has been used by humans to increase the shelf life of meat and vegetables. Food processed by smoke was stored for a long time, which made it easier for a civilization that did not know a planned economy and refrigeration to survive in times of famine. Nowadays, this approach to smoking is very rare, and we buy smoked products because of their original taste.
So, let's go to the store and take a look at the smoked meats counter.
The first option is smoked-boiled chicken leg
It is included in many salads, used as an independent snack and as a soup product for soup with smoked meats. Why smoked and boiled? Because according to the technological process, it is first smoked on hot smoke for 20-40 minutes, and then cooked without bringing to a boil or brought to readiness with hot steam (in principle, at home it is possible to bring it to readiness in microwave oven). In general, among smoked meats, one of the most safe products based on the presence of harmful components (light phenols, formaldehyde, benzopyrene). Plus, stores selling poultry and poultry products are thoroughly checked by regulatory authorities, so when buying smoked ham, You don't risk your health much. Standard advice - find out the date of manufacture and storage temperature. When stored in a regular refrigerator, the shelf life of boiled-smoked legs is 48 hours, in the freezer (some loss of taste) - 120 hours, in vacuum packaging and in the refrigerator - 20 days.
But there is also a pitfall here. More precisely, two. First: a self-respecting manufacturer actually smokes legs and chickens using natural sawdust. Those who want to save money use “liquid smoke”. What this entails - read below, here I will only tell you how to distinguish a naturally smoked chicken or leg from a “chemically processed” one: natural has a slight smell of smoke, treated with “liquid smoke” - it emits the acrid smell of a smoke bomb.
The second point: the use of carrageenan, a natural gelling agent, which is obtained in the food industry by processing red seaweed. It is added to meat products when they want to increase weight by absorbing water. Formally, at the moment this food supplement is not considered harmful, although WHO no longer recommends its use for baby food. Recent studies, including those related to work with human and animal genomes, show that E-407, as carrageenan may also be designated on packaging, can increase the likelihood of gastrointestinal ulcers, as well as cancer of the digestive system. Yes, because it’s smoked and boiled chicken leg is food product, then all the ingredients must be indicated on the package (or from the seller, if you buy it by weight), but, alas, this is not done everywhere.
Second option. Various types of smoked sausages
I’ll say right away that I won’t talk much about sausage in this article (many acquaintances have already thrown virtual pillows at me for telling me what sausage and frankfurters are made from, and now they don’t even want to look at sausages). I just don't recommend buying it. And there is too. With the possible exception of liver and blood. Until recently, I also included raw smoked sausages in this list, but current realities show that it is becoming more and more difficult to find a normal sausage manufacturer. If you want to talk in more detail, write, I will dwell on this issue in a separate article. In the meantime, I recommend eating only homemade sausage or, if you are a happy friend of a neighboring farmer, then the farmer's
Third option. Smoked fish
There are two types of smoked fish on the market - hot and cold smoked. I think you know the difference in taste. But let's talk about process conditions and shelf life.
During hot smoking, the product is processed with smoke at a temperature of 90 - 130 °C up to full readiness. This is a quick and simple method of smoking, however, the shelf life is short and strictly regulated - 72 hours at a temperature not exceeding 8 degrees (formally, with full compliance with the smoking specifications and use freezers this period can be increased up to 5 times, but, in any case, hot smoked fish cannot be kept in a regular refrigerator for more than 72 hours. After this, it must be thrown away).
With cold smoking, the processing is carried out with colder smoke at a temperature of 20 - 30 ° C for a long time, with mandatory salting and sometimes drying. The shelf life of cold smoked fish is much longer: mackerel, mackerel and herring can be stored for up to 60 days at a temperature not exceeding -2 °C, up to 30 days at a temperature not exceeding 8 °C, other types of fish - one and a half times longer. Keep in mind, however, that balyk products, as more open products, i.e. with damaged skin and muscle tissue, have less shelf life, and according to the specifications they must be stored for no more than 30 days at a temperature not higher than -2 °C.
Subject to all technical specifications Cold smoked fish is less harmful - chilled smoke contains less light phenols, formaldehyde and benzopyrene. However, if you deviate even slightly from the specifications, the duration of the smoke treatment will immediately negate this advantage.
Well, so what, you say. I came to the store, asked the seller to write down the date of production of the fish, or looked at the label, chose which one I liked, and bought it. Alas, 72 hours for hot smoked fish is often too short for sale, and sellers often re-stick the labels, and when asked to show documents on acceptance of the goods, they fuss different ways. And this was just the first “but”.
The second thing is that very often the fish that enters the smokehouse is one that was not sold as fresh. That is, in fact, stale, with dullness and other “joys” that the owner dreams of “eliminating” with the help of smoking, read: to kill one smell with another. It is extremely difficult to assess the degree of unhelpfulness of such a product.
And there is also a third thing - from a conversation with the owner of a chain of Novosibirsk beer stores, I learned that more than 3/4 of the smoked fish on the market are products produced using “liquid smoke”. And this is where you have to seriously look into it.
What is this notorious "liquid smoke"? This - food flavoring in the form of a liquid or powder, intended to achieve the taste and aroma that appears in food during the smoking process, as well as to preserve the product. In our country, “liquid smoke” most often is a liquid produced according to specifications, which (at its core) regulate the stages of the production process, which should be as follows:
- Smoke condensation of hard deciduous wood (alder, apple, bird cherry, beech, aspen)
- Separation of the resulting condensate into fractions: water-soluble and insoluble. The first fraction is used in further production.
- Primary cleaning of the solution to remove harmful components.
- Fine purification (distillation, concentration, membrane or osmotic separation)
- Pre-preparation (adding flavors, preservatives and food additives)
- Maturation (oak or other containers made from hard deciduous wood with tanning properties - oak, cherry, etc.)
- Taring
In 2000, I was on a tour of the production of liquid smoke at a plant near Prague. I don’t know where “liquid smoke” was invented - in the West or here, but I was shocked by the production technology itself: raw materials from trees of a certain age, chromatographic control harmful substances at each stage, the use of white and red wine, as well as beer to dissolve the smoke, aging the final product for up to 2 years in barrels made of wood of various species, non-use of preservatives, training of smokehouse personnel to work with the product. I was impressed.
And I also remember well the artisanal method used to make “liquid smoke” in the 90s in Russia, when I first encountered it. There was no talk of any control of production and raw materials, nor of cleaning as such. Smoke from some kind of boiler bubbled into well-worn vats, the resulting solution settled, and then underwent rough filtration and was immediately bottled. Out of curiosity (I was then a graduate student at the Institute of Catalysis SB RAS), we analyzed the product on a chromatograph and were horrified: the content of benzopyrene and phenols exceeded all reasonable limits. What about benzopyrene - the content of banal heavy resins, which the product should not have contained at all, was simply off the charts!
Do you think that the culture of producing “liquid smoke” has grown since then? - May be. Is “liquid smoke” used to give the product a smoky taste in the recommended proportions, especially considering that it was already stale when it came to smoking? - May be. Do they use good expensive purified liquid smoke in “smokehouses” so that the buyer receives a product that is not harmful to health? - May be. Not too much "maybe"? And I suggest you simply compare the smell and taste of naturally smoked fish and fish prepared using liquid smoke.
But where can you get it, this good, fresh, naturally smoked fish? Alas, there are few options: make friends who smoke fish and control the process, acquire metrological instruments and check every fish purchased, or get your own smokehouse. I suspect the last option is the simplest. Moreover, you don’t have to buy a smokehouse, but you can make it yourself, for example, from an old refrigerator.
Moreover, when smoking yourself, you can use the most optimal temperature regime smoking, the so-called intermediate, from 40 to 90 degrees. The final product prepared in this mode contains fewer harmful substances than both hot smoking and cold smoking. Plus, you can diversify both what you smoke and what you smoke with, getting something incredibly tasty on a Friday night that no store will sell you!
And finally, about the harmfulness
Perhaps it’s time to talk about the notorious “blow to the liver and pancreas” that we get after tasting smoked products. Having found out that self-smoking reduces the amount of harmful substances, it still needs to be said that smoked products harmful. Particularly harmful to children under 12 years of age and persons over 50 years of age, pregnant and nursing mothers. The list of diseases and ailments for which doctors recommend not to eat smoked foods is huge. So, maybe not eat at all? - Reasonable approach. What if you really want it? We again come to the thesis “if you can’t, but really want to, then you can.” Don't eat smoked food every day, watch how you feel after you've eaten a decent amount of it. Use more often lactic acid products. Don't drink low-quality alcohol: fusel oils, methanol and acetaldehyde in combination with phenols and benzopyrene - very scary biological weapons. And try to either start your own smokehouse or find a manufacturer you trust.
Bon appetit!
The monthly diet of the average person is quite varied. Many foods are consumed, including smoked fish. Smoked fish is part of the most common food products and is in great demand among buyers. However, one should not forget that overuse smoked fish may have a negative impact on your health.
SMOKED FISH This is a ready-to-eat product with a specific taste and smell, which is produced by processing products of incomplete combustion of wood. Fish is smoked by salting, drying and smoking.
Smoking is one of the ways of canning and preserving food.
The preservative property as a result of smoking is achieved due to partial dehydration original product, bactericidal action and antioxidant ability of smoke smoke.
Harm
Why is smoked fish dangerous?
Frequent consumption of smoked fish can negatively affect human health.
Secondly, as a result of smoking, the fish turns from useful product into harmful. When smoking, carcinogenic substances are formed (smoke contains more than a thousand chemical compounds - the most dangerous is benzpirene), which when regular use contribute to the development of cancer.
The most high content such substances in hot smoked fish. At high temperatures, carcinogens settle faster on the skin of the fish and penetrate inside more actively. At the same time, the most dangerous is hot smoked fish (especially thin-skinned fish - herring, herring, mackerel, capelin, etc.) cooked over a fire. Hot smoked fish prepared in industrial conditions will be less harmful than fish smoked in artisanal conditions.
The least dangerous thick-skinned fish (bream, catfish, carp, trout, etc.) are cold smoked. It contains virtually no carcinogens.
In modern Food Industry smoking of fish occurs using chemical substances- “liquid smoke”. The fish is placed in a small container into which “liquid smoke” is poured, and after some time (a few minutes) the fish acquires a smoked taste.
Smoking mackerel using liquid smoke 
Benefit
What are the benefits of fish
Fish contains iodine, fluorine, magnesium, selenium, iron, zinc, phosphorus, calcium, vitamins E, D, B12, B6, A, polyunsaturated fatty acids omega-3 and omega-6, as well as easily digestible proteins.
Eating fish reduces the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases
Eating fish regularly reduces the likelihood of developing cardiovascular diseases. Thanks to polyunsaturated fatty acids omega-3 and omega-6, cholesterol levels in the blood are reduced, thereby solving the cause of blood clots. blood vessels. This is also why, with the help of fish oil, the excessive tendency of the blood to clot is reduced.
How to eat smoked fish
You shouldn't eat the skin from smoked fish, since it contains the main share of carcinogens. It is preferable to choose thick-skinned smoked fish - the majority of carcinogenic substances are retained in its skin.
Between hot and cold smoking, it is advisable to choose thick-skinned, cold-smoked fish, since its meat contains practically no carcinogens (they remain in the skin of the fish). But nutritionists recommend eating cold smoked fish no more than once a week.
The skin of smoked fish contains the main share of carcinogenic substances
Cold smoked fish becomes safe if it is first (before smoking) salted for 14 days.
ADDITIONALLY
How to smoke fish correctly
If you decide to smoke fish at home, then you need to know the technology of how to do it correctly. Below are the most popular types smoking
Types of fish salting
- under warm salting conditions (15–16 degrees) - from 5 to 9 days;
- under cold salting conditions (5–6 degrees) - from 6 to 13 days;
- under conditions of dry salting in uncut fish - from 9 to 13 days, and sometimes from 7 to 12 days.
For cooking dried fish it is salted using one of these methods for 3–5 days, and then dried for 2 weeks.
Smoking is great way preserve the fish, give it unique taste and aroma. Prepared in this way, it copes well with the role of a main dish, but can serve as an addition to salads, sandwiches, various pastes. People are most likely to eat here smoked mackerel or, herring and salmon, which can be bought in almost every supermarket. But there are also fans of this smoked fish, like bream, crucian carp... but is smoked fish healthy? Let's figure it out together.
What kind of fish is smoked?
Smoking is one of the the oldest ways preservation of fish and other food. Smoke and high temperature destroy bacteria and delicately dry the meat, and, in addition, give it a golden brown color, a unique deep aroma and taste. It should be remembered that the most important thing in the smoking process is what kind of fish is processed. Suitable for this different kinds, both freshwater and marine, especially those that have little small bones. Not only the type of fish matters, but also its freshness. You can be sure that the product will be tasty, good quality, if a little time has passed from the moment of catching the fish to its smoking and consumption.
Smoking fish step by step
Before the smoking process, the fish is scrupulously cleaned, the gills and eyes are removed, because they cause rapid deterioration of the inhabitants of reservoirs. Then they must lie in brine for several hours: this makes the meat more “stable”, gives it a slightly salty taste. For smoking, they mainly use wood from deciduous trees, especially beech or ash, and sometimes pear and apple trees. The choice is important because it affects both the taste and color of the fish meat.
Depending on the time and temperature at which the process is carried out, hot and cold smoking are distinguished. Warm smoke is most often used to treat freshwater varieties, as well as flounder and herring. This is done in three stages, in each of which the temperature rises for several hours. At the end it is approximately 70-90 degrees. Good fish hot smoked has characteristic smell and a pronounced taste, remains elastic, juicy and quite fatty.
Cold smoking is based on the fact that the fish is first dried in small quantity smoke at a temperature not exceeding 30 degrees. This stage can last up to 24 hours. The next step is to submit more cold smoke, which is used to treat the fish 2-3 times a day for several days. The longer the fish stays in the smokehouse, the longer its subsequent storage period.
Is it healthy to eat smoked fish?
Nutritionists agree that fresh fish should be a constant component of the diet of each of us. What about smoked fish? Is it worth eating? It's worth it, because she is also great source healthy fats and omega-3 fatty acids, as well as valuable nutrients. Therefore, even people on a diet should not exclude smoked fish from their menu. 
However, it should be consumed only occasionally, because many products of this kind contain too much sodium, the excess of which is not beneficial for the body.
Experts also note that not all smoked fish is equally valuable. It all depends on whether it was originally fresh and of good quality, and on how it was smoked - traditional method or using chemicals. Obviously, in the second case, smoked fish becomes a questionable product in terms of health benefits.
The ideal option is when the fish comes to the smokehouse from a proven reservoir and is smoked immediately after catching, and then reaches our table within a maximum of 24 hours. Thanks to this, she will not only have a bright, rich taste, but will also retain all of its nutritional value, will only bring health benefits.
You can also find out how it goes
Smoking has been known to people since ancient times as a way to preserve food. Smoked products could be stored long time, in addition, they had excellent taste. Currently, smoking is used to improve taste characteristics product. Thus, smoked fish delicacies are in great demand among consumers. The presented material explains the benefits and harms of smoked fish and what smoking methods can be used.
Types of smoking
There are several smoking methods that are used both at home and in large industries:
- by hot smoked when the smoke temperature fluctuates in the range of 80-170 degrees Celsius;
- by cold working smoke when the temperature does not exceed 40 degrees;
- by semi-hot smoked at a temperature of 50-80 degrees;
- through smokeless treatment using special smoking liquids.
The latter method can only be called smoking with a stretch. All manipulations with the product come down to immersing the main raw material in a special chemical substance known as “liquid smoke”. Chemical composition This “marinade” allows you to give the product the required color in a short time, taste qualities and a characteristic smoky smell. At the same time, this method of processing products using “liquid smoke” is the least expensive, as a result of which unscrupulous producers of smoked meats often resort to it.
Important! Fish and any other products processed using “liquid smoke” are harmful to human health.
Harm of smoked fish
Conclusions about how unhealthy eating smoked fish is directly depends on the method used for smoking. It is definitely harmful to eat foods that have been treated with “liquid smoke.” As for the fish that has gone through the whole technological process smoking, it is believed that the product processed with hot smoke is more harmful. This is due to the fact that during the combustion process a large number of chemical compounds are formed, some of which, along with the smoke, penetrate into the fish itself. One of the most dangerous is benzopyrene, which is formed as a result of combustion and belongs to substances of the first hazard class. In thin-skinned hot-smoked fish, the amount of benzopyrene will be significantly higher than in thick-skinned fish.
When eating fish cooked in hot smoke, it is recommended not to eat the skin, which contains greatest number carcinogenic substances harmful to the body
A large amount of salt in fish tissue poses a health threat to people suffering from diseases of the cardiovascular and excretory systems of the body.
The benefits of smoked delicacies
Despite the fact that in certain cases smoked fish can cause serious damage to health, this product is very popular and is considered by many to be one of the favorite delicacies. From the point of view of nutritionists, eating smoked fish can even be beneficial if certain measures are taken, especially when it comes to products obtained by cold smoking. The fish itself is a treasure trove useful microelements and vitamins, easily digestible fatty acids. Much of this is destroyed when heat treatment. Moreover, when frying with oil, a large amount of cholesterol is added to the dish, while smoked fish does not contain it at all. The level of preservation of vitamins and microelements in fish products cold smoked over 80%, so periodic consumption of such products will not only not harm, but will also bring certain health benefits.
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