The Process for Retort Smoked Arctic Charr
	1st step: The Arctic Charr Fillets are "dry brined" that is to say salt or salt and seasonings are applied manually. This is principally because on fillets where you have mixed thickness putting product in liquid brine would result in some being too salty and others not salty enough. 2nd step: SMOKING the smoker is loaded with the salted fillets and allowed to stand for about an hour then placed in the smoker. Initially we air dry the fillets somewhat to create a skin on the flesh. This skin helps in absorbing a smoke flavour. We typically do our smoking at about 70 to 75 degrees F for about 6 hours on fish of this size. The smoking process is designed to introduce flavour only. Smoking alone under these conditions does not ensure commercial sterility. 3rd step: PORTIONING & POUCHING The fillets are unloaded from the smoker at this point and then moved over to a portioning station where the fillets are portioned to an exact specification. The portioning and pouch filling are both done manually. 4th step: VACUUM PACKING The filled pouches travel over to the vacuum packing station where they are vacuum packed and sealed. As they are being sealed someone is loading them into baskets which are lifted into the vertical retort by crane. When the cook is sealed and loaded the cooking process begins. 5th step: RETORTING The process of cooking (to achieve sterility) is done in a large scale pressure cooker known as a retort. This is typically done for about 65 minutes at about 250 F. The actual fish is probably cooked in the first 10 minutes the rest of the cooking time is purely to achieve sterility. We (as an industry) have been doing canning commercially on the west coast for about 150 years and as an industry believe that our quality standards are second to none. 6th step: POST COOK Cooked pouches are cooled down by flooding the retort with water and once the water is discharged the pouches are removed and dried under an air knife and then taken upstairs by elevator for inspection and box up for shipping. This process results in a tasty product that has been cooked in its own juices and has a recognized 5 year shelf life.
	Back