beef or venison jerky

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there are a million good jerky recipes. i can give you a few basics and from there, you can branch out on your own and do some experimenting!

first above all - jerky is DRYING meat, not COOKING meat. keep your "jerky-making temperatures below 200 degrees if possible, closer to 140 would be even better. to make it in an oven, simply set your oven on the "warm setting.

second, at the very least, you want a good balance of salt/sweet and spicy. keep in mind that these flavours can come from a lot of sources. here are a few examples:

salt: salt, soy sauce, worcestershire sauce etc.

sweet: sugar, molasses, apple juice etc.

spicy: black pepper, red pepper, garlic, onion, tabasco etc.

third, a cure - some people say you HAVE to have a cure; others say you don't HAVE to have a cure. i lean on the side that says you don't HAVE to have one. between the salt content and the fact that, at the very least, the outside of the jerky is going to be dry and impermeable, you are not going to have any bacterial issues. having said that, if you are unsure of this, or if you plan to make jerky that is not very dry (more like "kippered" meat), then by all means use a cure. morton tenderquik seems, in my opinion, the be the most available and easiest to use. if you do use it, use it according to the package directions.

fourth - dry or wet brine? the purpose of jerky is to get moisture out of meat - to that end, i am lately interested mostly in the dry "brines" where you season the meat evenly and let the salt draw the moisture out. other times, such as when using juice and/or things like soy sauce, there is naturally going to be some moisture. still other times a recipe will call for some water in order to help evenly distribute the brine and flavours. none of these is wrong, but it is up to you to decide what you prefer. no matter what, be sure to mix your meat around while it is soaking in all those flavours!

smoke - to me, jerky needs smoke flavour, whether it comes from a few spashes of liquid smoke added to the brine, or is acquired naturally during thedrying process in a smoker, you need to have some smoke. wrights makes a great liquid smoke, but for a very small investment you can get yourself a smoker (for jerky, i recommend the little or big chief, but there are dozens of choices - you can even build your own easily) and have more options than simply "hickory" flavour. cherry, apple, maple and alder are all good choices, and there are many more. never use pine or evergreen wood for smoke flavour - you will get sick! 

thickness of cuts - this is a personal perefernce. if you stick to the findamentals above you can go anywhere from a 1/16- to 1/2-inch thick and still have some good stuff. technically, i suppose you could even go thicker than that, but what you will end up with is will be closer to south african biltong or romanian pastramă, (not pastrami!) than jerky. start with something in the 3/8- to 1/4-inch range and then adjust according to your tastes.

hopefully these fundamentals will get you on a good path. as for a specific recipe, someone somewhere will come along with one, or hopefully the information provided will give you some ideas to try on your own! 

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TasunkaWitko Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Visit Members Homepage Add to Buddy List Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9389	Post Options Post Reply Quote TasunkaWitko Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Topic: beef or venison jerky Posted: 09 August 2010 at 12:51
	there are a million good jerky recipes. i can give you a few basics and from there, you can branch out on your own and do some experimenting! first above all - jerky is DRYING meat, not COOKING meat. keep your "jerky-making temperatures below 200 degrees if possible, closer to 140 would be even better. to make it in an oven, simply set your oven on the "warm setting. second, at the very least, you want a good balance of salt/sweet and spicy. keep in mind that these flavours can come from a lot of sources. here are a few examples: salt: salt, soy sauce, worcestershire sauce etc. sweet: sugar, molasses, apple juice etc. spicy: black pepper, red pepper, garlic, onion, tabasco etc. third, a cure - some people say you HAVE to have a cure; others say you don't HAVE to have a cure. i lean on the side that says you don't HAVE to have one. between the salt content and the fact that, at the very least, the outside of the jerky is going to be dry and impermeable, you are not going to have any bacterial issues. having said that, if you are unsure of this, or if you plan to make jerky that is not very dry (more like "kippered" meat), then by all means use a cure. morton tenderquik seems, in my opinion, the be the most available and easiest to use. if you do use it, use it according to the package directions. fourth - dry or wet brine? the purpose of jerky is to get moisture out of meat - to that end, i am lately interested mostly in the dry "brines" where you season the meat evenly and let the salt draw the moisture out. other times, such as when using juice and/or things like soy sauce, there is naturally going to be some moisture. still other times a recipe will call for some water in order to help evenly distribute the brine and flavours. none of these is wrong, but it is up to you to decide what you prefer. no matter what, be sure to mix your meat around while it is soaking in all those flavours! smoke - to me, jerky needs smoke flavour, whether it comes from a few spashes of liquid smoke added to the brine, or is acquired naturally during thedrying process in a smoker, you need to have some smoke. wrights makes a great liquid smoke, but for a very small investment you can get yourself a smoker (for jerky, i recommend the little or big chief, but there are dozens of choices - you can even build your own easily) and have more options than simply "hickory" flavour. cherry, apple, maple and alder are all good choices, and there are many more. never use pine or evergreen wood for smoke flavour - you will get sick! thickness of cuts - this is a personal perefernce. if you stick to the findamentals above you can go anywhere from a 1/16- to 1/2-inch thick and still have some good stuff. technically, i suppose you could even go thicker than that, but what you will end up with is will be closer to south african biltong or romanian pastramă, (*not* pastrami!) than jerky. start with something in the 3/8- to 1/4-inch range and then adjust according to your tastes. hopefully these fundamentals will get you on a good path. as for a specific recipe, someone somewhere will come along with one, or hopefully the information provided will give you some ideas to try on your own!
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TasunkaWitko Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Visit Members Homepage Add to Buddy List Admin Group Joined: 25 January 2010 Location: Chinook, MT Status: Offline Points: 9389	Post Options Post Reply Quote TasunkaWitko Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 22 September 2010 at 07:12
	although i frequently use cure in the form of tender-quik, especially with jerky that will be on the "moist" end of the spectrum, i've found over the years that it isn't always necessary in every situation. i've yet to see a bacteria that can thrive on a dry, rock-hard, salty strip of dense meat. when making jerky in the oven or smoker, my temps are usually running close to 160; however, my dehydrator runs at 140 degrees. the plains indians had sun and wind, and at best, their jerky preparation temps were around 90. as for research on food poisoning, we have done quite a bit of it here and in fact have a permanent sticky dedicated to the subject here: http://foodsoftheworld.activeboards.net/food-safety_topic254.html we encourage all members to read up on the subject, then make their own decisions based on their own research.
	If you are a visitor and like what you see, please click here and join the discussions in our community!