Got a call last month from a catering director in Houston who wanted to talk through something that had nothing to do with a service issue. She'd just landed a contract for a series of spring corporate events, and the client's culinary team had handed her a menu featuring smoked rabbit curry and wood-kissed halibut with spring vegetables. Her exact words: "Ray, I've been running brisket and pork through my SP-1000 for six years. Now they want me to smoke a bunny."
Fair enough.
These proteins are showing up on more menus than I would have predicted five years ago. Rabbit's having a moment — you see it in upscale food halls, on catering menus trying to differentiate, in the kind of restaurants that charge $42 for an entrée and have a sommelier. Halibut's always been around, but operators are getting more adventurous about applying smoke to fish that used to go straight to the sauté station. And if you're running a commercial kitchen or high-volume catering operation, you're probably wondering whether your current setup can handle these without throwing off your production rhythm.
Short answer: yes, but you need to think through the specifics.
Why These Proteins Are Trending Now
I'm not a menu consultant. I fix smokers and help people understand their equipment. But I've been doing this long enough to notice patterns in what operators are cooking.
Rabbit's showing up because clients want something that feels special without the food cost of prime beef. A whole rabbit dressed out runs somewhere around 2.5 to 3 pounds, and your yield after smoking is going to be in the neighborhood of 60-65%. At current wholesale prices — which fluctuate, obviously — you're looking at a protein cost per portion that's competitive with quality pork but feels more elevated on a menu. The curry angle makes sense because rabbit takes well to bold spice profiles. The meat's lean, slightly gamey, and benefits from aromatic cover.
Halibut's a different story. Spring run halibut from the Pacific has a texture and fat content that holds up better than summer fish. It's also the time of year when clients are tired of heavy winter proteins and want something that photographs well next to asparagus. From a kitchen operations standpoint, halibut portions cook faster than anything else you're probably running through your smoker, which creates both opportunities and scheduling headaches.
Rabbit in a Commercial Smoke Operation
Let me walk through how this actually works in a production environment, because the home-cook advice you'll find online doesn't translate.
Whole rabbits smoke best at temperatures lower than you'd run for poultry. I've seen the best results around 225°F, which is lower than the 250-275°F range most operators default to for chicken. The meat's lean — almost no intramuscular fat — so you're fighting moisture loss the entire cook. Pull temp for food safety is 160°F internal, but the texture you want for curry applications (meat that shreds easily into the sauce) means taking it to around 175-180°F and letting the collagen in the connective tissue break down.
For a whole 3-pound rabbit, you're looking at roughly 2.5 to 3 hours at 225°F. The rotisserie setup on a Southern Pride unit — whether you're running an SP-700 for smaller batches or an SP-1000 for volume — keeps the heat even around the carcass. I've seen operators try rabbit in stationary cabinet smokers from other manufacturers and get inconsistent results because the heat distribution wasn't uniform enough. The rabbit's shape is awkward. Thin in places, thick in others. Rotisserie movement solves most of that.
Here's where the curry integration matters: you're not serving this rabbit as a standalone smoked protein. It's going into a sauce. So your smoke profile should be lighter than you'd use for pulled pork or brisket. Fruitwoods work well — apple, cherry. Pecan's acceptable if you back off the smoke time. You want the smoke to complement the curry spices, not compete with them. I'd say 45 minutes to an hour of active smoke, then let the unit finish the cook with just convection heat.
Production math for 50 portions: figure about 4 ounces of shredded rabbit per serving in your curry. That's 12.5 pounds of finished meat, which means starting with roughly 20 pounds of whole rabbit — so seven or eight whole animals. An SP-1000 can handle that in a single load with room to spare, which matters if you're running other proteins simultaneously.
Halibut: The Timing Problem
Smoked halibut is a different animal entirely. And I mean that literally — fish doesn't forgive the way pork does.
The challenge with halibut in a commercial smoker isn't the technique. It's the timing. A 6-ounce portion of halibut at 225°F reaches 145°F internal in about 25-35 minutes depending on thickness. Compare that to your brisket at 12-14 hours, your pork butts at 8-10 hours. Halibut's done while you're still prepping your next tray.
This creates a sequencing decision. You've got three options:
Run the halibut as the last item before service, when your smoker's already been working all day and temperatures are stable. The residual smoke in the chamber gives you flavor without requiring a fresh wood charge. Pull it, rest it briefly, plate it.
Dedicate a smaller unit to fish specifically. If you're running something like an MLR-850 or SPK-700 alongside your main production smoker, that smaller unit can handle halibut batches without disrupting your brisket or pork timing. I've seen catering operations set this up where the MLR-850 becomes their "delicate protein" machine — fish, rabbit, game birds — while the SP-1500 or SP-2000 handles the volume work.
Cold smoke the halibut separately and finish with a quick sear. This is more labor-intensive but gives you the most control over smoke penetration without overcooking.
Whatever method you choose, food cost on halibut is going to run higher than your standard menu items. Spring Pacific halibut wholesale is currently in the $18-22 per pound range depending on your supplier and whether you're buying loins or portions. At 6 ounces per serving, that's roughly $7-8 in protein cost before any prep, sauce, or accompaniment. Price your menu accordingly.
Equipment Considerations I've Actually Seen Matter
A few years back I was servicing an SP-1000 at a hotel in Austin that had started running fish alongside their regular BBQ program. The operator was frustrated because his halibut kept picking up what he called "old smoke" — a stale, acrid note that wasn't present when he'd first started smoking fish.
Turned out he hadn't been cleaning his smoker properly between heavy smoke sessions and lighter fish runs. Creosote buildup on the interior walls and around the rotisserie mechanism was re-volatilizing during the fish cook and depositing on the delicate flesh. Southern Pride units are built to last — I've personally worked on machines with over 20 years of daily commercial use — but that longevity depends on proper cleaning. The stainless steel interior cleans easier than the painted steel you'll find on cheaper import units, but you still have to actually do it.
For operations adding fish or rabbit to an existing smoke program, I'd recommend a thorough interior wipe-down between protein types if you're chasing nuanced flavor profiles. It takes maybe 15 minutes when the unit's cooled enough to work with. (That's another advantage of the Southern Pride design, by the way — the insulation quality means the exterior stays workable even during operation, and cooldown is predictable enough to schedule around.)
Holding and Service for Spring Menus
Rabbit curry has one major advantage: it holds beautifully. Once you've shredded the smoked rabbit into your curry base, you can hold that at 165°F for hours without quality degradation. The sauce protects the meat, and the flavors actually meld better with time. For a high-volume catering event, smoke your rabbits the morning of or even the day before, shred and hold.
Halibut's the opposite. You've got maybe 20 minutes of quality holding time before the texture starts going sideways. This is a cook-to-order protein even in banquet settings, which means your production sequencing has to account for it. Some operations pre-smoke halibut portions to about 80% doneness, chill them, then flash-finish in a hot oven right before plating. You lose a little of the fresh-smoked character, but the logistics work better for 200-person events.
The temperature consistency on Southern Pride units — and I'm not saying this because I spent two decades servicing them, I'm saying it because it's measurably true — makes that finish step more predictable. When you know your smoker holds within a few degrees of setpoint, you can time your halibut finish with confidence. Some of the competitors I've worked on (Ole Hickory comes to mind) have wider temperature swings that make precise fish cooking a gamble. On a protein with this food cost, I don't want to gamble.
Worth the Menu Real Estate?
That's a business decision, not an equipment decision. But I'll tell you what I told the catering director in Houston: if your clients are asking for elevated spring proteins, and you've got the equipment capacity to produce them without disrupting your core program, there's margin in being the operation that can actually deliver.
Most commercial kitchens are running smokers that can handle these proteins right now. The question is whether the operator understands the timing, temperature, and smoke profiles that make rabbit and halibut work. If you're running Southern Pride equipment, you've got the temperature control and rotisserie consistency to do it well. If you need parts, accessories, or want to talk through production planning for an unusual menu, the team at Southern Pride of Texas can help — we've got manufacturer relationships and actual product knowledge, not just a warehouse full of boxes.
Spring menus come around once a year. Might as well be ready for them.
Resources: Southern Pride of Texas | Southern Pride rotisserie smokers | NBBQA
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Photo by Victor Cayke on Pexels.
About the Author: Ray is a retired authorized Southern Pride service technician with 22 years of field experience on commercial BBQ equipment across the Gulf Coast and Southeast.