506 
BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
SMOKED SHAD, FLOUNDERS, LAKE TROUT, CARP, ETC. 
In the Chesapeake region and at various points along the coast small quantities 
of shad are smoked, usually iii iirecisely the same manner as already described for 
river herring or alewives. Formerly many barrels of “economy shad” salted on the 
Kennebec Eiver were smoked, but the demand ceased about 1880. A superior quality 
of smoked shad may be made by rubbing line salt, saltpeter, and sugar or molasses 
over the fresh fish, and after they are struck, smoking them a few days at an even 
temperature. These are far superior to those prepared from salted shad. 
A few flounders are smoked each year in Kew York and other populous centers of 
the Atlantic seaboard, the quantity probably amounting to about 15,000 pounds 
annually. The small flounders weighing half a pound or less are used, and these are 
eviscerated, pickled with brine in butts for about 2 hours, strung on smoke rods, 
drained, and cold-smoked for 8 to 10 hours. Sometimes these fish are hot-smoked 
for half an hour or so after the color has been set by the cold-smoking. 
Menhaden and butterflsh have been smoked to more or less extent during the 
past few years, but few are so prepared at present. 
Smoked lake trout and carp are prepared to a small extent in the manner already 
described for lake herring or whiteflsh, but little demand exists for these products. 
Efforts have been made to produce marketable articles of smoked hake and pol- 
lock, but the business has never assumed any commercial importance. There seems 
no valid reason why smoked pollock at least should not become popular, the flesh of 
that species seeming well suited to this method of curing. Smoked mullet is a very 
choice article, but practically none is prepared for the general market. 
In 1885 experiments were made by the United States Fish Commission to intro- 
duce smoked kiugfish, which abound ofl:' Key West. The Fish Commission report 
for 1885, p. Liii, states, in substance : 
These fish were prepared with much care at Gloucester, and proved to he an excellent smoked 
fish, being tested hy many experts, some of whom pronounced them ecxual or even superior to smoked 
halibut or salmon, being free from the rather rank taste that the smoked halibut sometimes has. 
Tileflsh have been smoked as an experiment by several persons, but experts differ 
as to their qualities. The Fish Commission report for 1882, p. 247, states: 
lu the summer of 1879 Capt. George Friend, of Gloucester, smoked some of the tilefish, and he, 
as well as several others who ate them, stated that they were excellent, rivaling smoked halibut in 
richness and fiavor. On the other hand, Mr. William H. Wonson, 3d, does not speak so highly of its 
fine qualities as a food-fish under the same conditions. He says that while it is certainly very good 
and wholesome, as well as a desirable article of food when smoked, it can not compete with the 
halibut, and is no better, in fact, than smoked haddock. 
