Plank Cooking

[Jim]

There was a bit of discussion up in the Welcome Forum regarding Plank Cooking, so I thought, "hey, let's run with it...."

Some history, from www.InternationalRecipes.com

A cooking method handed down by American Indians whereby meat or fish is cooked — usually by baking or broiling — on a wooden board. Planking imparts a soupçon of the wood's flavor to the food. Food referred to as "planked" has been cooked in this manner.

For some recipe and technique tips check out the
Seattle Times Article that offers up a recipe on planked salmon and some local flavor.

From what I know about planking in these parts. It goes back to open-hearth colonial cooking. Whereas a piece of fish, usually shad, was tacked to a cedar plank and placed vertically in a groove in the front of the hearth to cook. The fine bones within the fillet would have gelatinized from the heat and the wood would impart its flavor. It would have been removed from the plank for a more formal affair or left intact for a family meal; like a TV dinner, just no TV.

Anybody else with some planking insight?

[Jock]

I've had sea scallops cooked on cedar. Acually, cheap cedar shims you buy in a bundle at the lumber yard. They are used in construction work for hanging doors (amongst other things.) The wood is untreated so it is quite safe. You brush the shim with oil and lay the scallops along it. Under the salamander for a few minutes and you can see the cedar oils bubling up to flavor the fish. Mmmm, delicious.

Jock

[Chefkell]

I do as Jock explained with a scallop stuffed salmon in the fall. Roofing shingles and a saw to cut them to shape, oil the wood, add the fish and sally. Pinot Noir reduction goes well...

Make sure they're untreated though. I know they don't treat them here in Michigan, but in Texas they treat them with arsenic to keep the termites and other bugs away...not fun to eat

[Isa]

Aren't those plank treated Jock??

[Jock]

No, I checked with the supplier in Oregon.
When I worked at the Campton Place Hotel they used to use them a lot there. Every couple of months a nervous chef would ask me to double check. I was almost on first name terms with the folks at the lumber mill

(Not long to go now)

Jock

[Isa]

Thanks for the info Jock, one more question does your meal end up tasting like the coats stored in a cedar closet? Seriously it's quite an intense odour, how is the taste?

[Jock]

Very mild smoky flavor. Not intense at all. Maybe we can try some when you get here

Jock

[sparrowgrass]

Western red cedar (Thuja plicata) is what you cook on, or make shingles/siding out of. Eastern red cedar (Juniperus virginiana) is for closets and cedar chests and fence posts. The two are not closely related, and shouldn't be substituted one for the other.

(BS Forestry, SIU, 1977)

[Isa]

Originally posted by Jock
Very mild smoky flavor. Not intense at all. Maybe we can try some when you get here

Jock

That would be wonderful Jock!