How Liquid Smoke Works

By cooling smoke, the hydrocarbons forming smoke can be condensed, thinned, and bottled in a liquid form. Learn about the process of bottling liquid smoke in this HowStuffWorks podcast.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
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brain Stuff from how stuff works dot com where smart happens. Hi,

(00:23):
I'm Marshall brain. A listener wrote into ask what is
liquid smoke? You may have seen liquid smoke called for
in certain recipes, but what is it. Liquid smoke is
literally liquefied smoke. In a prior podcast, we talked about
what smoke is. It is volatile hydrocarbons that evaporate from

(00:45):
wood when you heat wood up. What this means is
that by cooling smoke, you can cause the hydrocarbons to condense.
What you get is a dark, sticky liquid that contains
all the flavors of smoke. If you says that condensate,
thin it out a little, and put it in a bottle,
you have liquid smoke. The process starts by taking wood

(01:08):
chips or sawdust, putting them in a big metal container,
and then heating it. The heat evaporates the volatile hydrocarbons.
Then you run the smoke into a condenser, where cold
coils caused the smoke to turn back into liquid form.
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(01:29):
how stuff works dot com. For more on this and
thousands of other topics, go to how stuff works dot com.
Brain Stuff is sponsored by Harry's dot com. Get a
great shaving experience for a fraction of the price. The
quality of the shave is so important that Harry's purchased
the factory that makes their blades. Fifteen dollars gets you
a set that includes a handle, three blades, and shave cream.

(01:50):
Go to Harry's dot com. Use the code brain stuff
to say five dollars off your first purchase.