Do-It-Yourself: How to Dry or Smoke Fish, Part 2

07 September 201010

Men hang dried fish on a fence to be sold at a township near Cape Town, South Africa, in May.

This is the VOA Special English Development Report.

Today we have the second of two reports explaining how to prepare fish by drying or smoking them.

We talked last week about the first steps of cleaning and salting freshly caught fish. The directions can be found on our website, voaspecialenglish.com.

To dry fish, you will need either a drying table or a place to hang them. If a table is used, it should have a top made of wire screen or thin pieces of wood with space between each piece.

Lay the cleaned and salted fish, still wet, on the table. Do not let them touch each other. Be sure that air can flow around the fish from all sides, including the top and bottom.

Build a small smoky fire under the drying table for the first day to keep the flies away. After that, you can keep the flies away by covering the fish with a thin cloth. Do not let the cloth touch the fish.

Fish taste better if they are out of bright sunlight while they are being dried. For best results, put the drying table under a tree. Turn the fish over every other day. Small fish will dry in about three days if the air is dry. Large fish will take a week or ten days to dry.

After the fish have dried, place them in a basket. Cover them with clean paper or large leaves. Then put the basket in a cool, dry place off the ground.