The Genuine Secrecy of Secret Smokehouse
How a business started in a small shed came to provide smoked fish for some of London’s best restaurants.
Words Nicolas Payne-Baader
Photography Harriet Langford
“Here we go, that's the real money shot,” Max declares in his broad West Scotland accent as he swings open the heavy metal door of the smoker. The smoke clears to reveal neatly arranged whole fillets of Scottish salmon, laying bronze in the heat like a scene from Sexy Beast. “Of course I can’t let you photograph that,” he says, quickly snapping the door closed. It’s exactly what you’d expect from the man behind the Secret Smokehouse. The name is apt, and describes the project’s origins, when Max converted the shed at the end of his garden in Stepney into a mini smokehouse. It has since become something of a modus operandi, operating with a level of secrecy normally reserved for magic circles.
Having come from relative obscurity – and a converted shed – Secret Smokehouse has established itself as one of the most premium suppliers of smoked fish working with the likes of Claude Bosi, Heston Blumenthal and Claire Smyth as well as running a brisk retail offering from the production arch in London Fields. Max’s success has not gone unnoticed and his intense secrecy is his best protection from the prying eyes of large, industrial producers.
Success hasn’t come overnight. It was a decade ago in 2015 that Max decided to get out of his job in the media and turn his hobby in to something more serious, “I’d fucking had enough and started smoking fish,” he explains consicely. Growing up in the West of Scotland, good smoked salmon was just a part of daily life. This gave Max a passion and a desire to create something that was better than what was available in the supermarket. “I wanted to do something that I love doing,” he says. Fortunately he wasn’t the only one craving a better product in London, and he moved from his small shed into an arch in 2016.
Since then he’s only honed his craft. Although he will only use classic oak for his smoking, every other part of the process has been reworked and refined over the years. I ask how long the fillet stays in the smoker and I’m met with rejection. “Aye I can’t tell you that,” he replies with genuine intensity. What he will tell me is that the secret to good smoked salmon is more than just minutes in a smoker or how much salt is in your cure. “The process of how you handle it, cut it, smoke it, it’s all about touching it, feeling it,” Max explains “You have to have that natural sweetness and freshness.” To capture that, Max has fish come in every morning fresh from Scotland, each one is then filleted on site by his team before being cured overnight, smoked and then pinboned by hand.
As good as the work is within the smokehouse, Max is quick to point out that good sourcing is essential. “Suppliers will keep different breeding stock for different markets,” he explains, “so if you can get your hands on really the best salmon with great marbling, no fat in it and really firm, that’s the dream.” Max opens a cool box containing some recently filleted salmon, the flesh is bright orange, streaked through with white. Their eyes are clear and bright, like they took a wrong turn somewhere around The Isle of Aran and ended up swimming to East London.
That quality does come with a price tag and Max is fairly zen when discussing his prices. Secret Smokehouse is not inexpensive, running at £16 for 200grams. Max freely admits that supermarkets are much cheaper but the products are far from the same. “What’s the difference between a coffee made from Nescafe and one made by a cool dude on Broadway Market?” he asks “I’ll let you wrestle with that one.” Where Secret Smokehouse’s fish is smoked slowly by hand, larger producers will use a friction burner that grinds away and hammers in the flavour, this rush will always leave a metallic taste and diminish the real flavour of the fish according to Max. Nothing is rushed in his arch. The whole process – from the fish arriving through smoking, curing and slicing to being sent out again – takes at least three days but normally closer to a week. It’s not a pace that can really be increased even for the biggest or best client, sometimes meaning that restaurants are forced to push back their menus until the facility has a chance to increase production.
Max brings out a whole salmon fillet, only a few hours out of the smoker and lays it out on the chopping board. Taking a long knife with a rounded end which wouldn’t look out of place in a kebab shop, he begins to slice through it. The cutting is done at a sharp angle and with remarkable precision. “This is the D Cut,” he explains as paper thin, perfectly uniform slices of salmon pile up. “It always gives you a mild flavour so what you’re tasting is the salt, the smoke and the fish, that’s it.” Coming about a third of the way up the fillet, he switches angles and starts on a V Cut straight down through the fillet. “You create a little sashimi slice. The V Cut is a bit creamier, you get a much bolder flavour,” he explains before handing us both D and V cut slices. There’s a remarkable difference between the two, the D cut offers that essential smoked salmon flavour, plenty of smoke but maintaining that delicate sweetness he’d talked about. The V Cut felt like a totally different dish, soft and tender but with real handle, a soft pillowy texture that you wouldn’t normally associate with any fish let alone smoked salmon.
As we pile more and more slices of this balanced, creamy salmon into our mouths, Max looks up from his slicing. “It’s been a wonderful wee journey,” he says with a smile. “I’m smoking fish not curing cancer but my motto is always to do one thing well and I reckon this is pretty good.”
SLOP NEWS
Issue 08 available to order now
The Field Issue is now available to order on our website to delivery straight to your door. Exploring stories like Farmer Tom Jones’ and his longstanding relationships to restaurants like St John, foraging on the jurassic coast and the wines of Remi Poujol it’s an issue we’re very proud of.
Available here
Matassa New Vintage Launch at The Marksman
On the 26th June, Hackney Road’s The Marksman will be teaming up with Newcomer Wines to pour the very first releases from Tom Lubbe’s Matassa. The Roussilon-based wine maker is a pioneer of natural winemaking and creates incredible cuvees. The kitchen will be putting together a special menu including curry leaf fried cod’s cheeks, steak haché and bone marrow and parsley salad.
Bookings via the marksman with walk ins encouraged.
Sune summer party
On the 22nd June, Restaurant Sune on Broadway market will be welcoming Anna Sorgaard to celebrate Scandinavian Midsommer. There’ll be crayfish, flower crowns and plenty of pet nat while the menu will be playing the hits of Scandi summer including fried pickles, herring and summer berries and cream lollies.
Pop along from 4pm.