Where's There's Smoke, There's Salmon

For Neopol’s Dorian Brown and his mom, Barbara Lahnstein, where’s there’s smoke, there’s salmon.

The Lion Brothers Building on Hollins Street in West Baltimore surely has the best-smelling loading dock in America.

The seductive scent of burning oak smoking dozens of pounds of salmon that emanates from behind the back door of Neopol Savory Smokery’s ground-floor production kitchen is vaguely reminiscent of a campfire cookout—that is, if Scottish and Norwegian fish were on the menu instead of burgers and dogs. It’s the same intoxicating aroma that lured customers, like a siren song for the nose, to a stall in Belvedere Square Market for 15 years, where mother and son Barbara Lahnstein and Dorian Brown smoked fish, garlic, shrimp, turkey, mussels, sausage, and just about anything else they could think of before moving their food preparation operations here in June 2018.

Inside, two 35-by-80-inch J&R Manufacturing red metal smokers do their thing. The fish in them now is destined for Neopol’s three retail outlets and weekend farmers markets, where it will be devoured by rabid fans addicted to this particular brand of smoking.

Meeting that demand is one reason Brown and Lahnstein opened the production kitchen. They plan to sell their sandwiches, spreads, and salads to the public from this spot starting next year, but for now the more than 1,000 pounds of fresh-neverfrozen salmon—and everything else that they smoke here six days a week—supplies stores in Washington’s Union Market, Georgetown, and the original Belvedere Square location.

“I’m really grateful for everyone that supports us in D.C., but the love in Baltimore is different,” Brown says. “Belvedere is where the heart is. Our customers there are . . .”