I don’t tend to eat much fish, but in the supermarket earlier I saw some smoked salmon which didn’t need cooking, and some salmon fillets which did. They looked the same really - both ‘raw’. I decided to buy some of the fillet. It was nice, but a very different flavour from when I’ve tried smoked salmon in the past. The cooked fillet was quite chicken-y with a slight earthy/fishy taste, whereas smoked salmon has a very strong fish flavour.
Why do they taste so different? And why is smoked salmon safe to eat without cooking when other smoked fish do need cooking?
That doesn’t apply if the temperature is below what’s needed to kill bacteria and cold smoked salmon is smoked at temperatures too low to kill bacteria. Smoking inhibits bacteria growth a bit, but it’s mostly the curing that does it, and neither kill bacteria, it just slows it and allows healthy bacteria to take hold.
There’s also hot smoked salmon which is low and slow and above kill temp, but that has a much more cooked texture so op is probably talking about cold smoking. Cold smoking is riskier to do at home for these reasons and store cold smoked salmon is carefully controlled.