Home-Canned Smoked Fish: A New Processing Recommendation

Smoked fish often varies in moisture content. To kill Clostridium-botulinum spores, recommendations for home canning in glass jars must take this and the fill of the jar into account. Pale chum salmon were smoked to three levels of moisture loss (10, 20, 30%) and canned using household techniques. Heat penetration data from thermocouples showed that the slowest heating jars were more likely to be drier smoked fish that was packed tightly. To take this "worst-case scenario" into account, a process time of 110 min was established as the new recommendation for home canning smoked fish in pint jars at sea level under the experimental conditions which are outlined.