PF- Beef Jerky Recipe

(Official) Prairie flounder Beef Jerky Recipe.

Needed: 

1lb of lean red meat, not chicken, turkey, perch, flounder, pork, pigeon, or ferret.  One more time: No flounders.  This can’t be stressed enough.

2 tablespoons of fine black pepper.

¼ - 1/3    cup of soy sauce.

3 tablespoons of brown sugar.

One drop of EVOO.

1 teaspoon of liquid smoke.

Preparation:

First buy all the stuff you need.  See above.  Next, if you don’t have one, buy a food dehydrator.  It is not absolutely necessary, but it’s a lot cheaper to run than an oven. It also has the advantage of not taking over the oven for 8 to 10 hours.  Your significant other will than me for this advice alone. Don’t even try other appliances.  Toaster ovens, toasters, bagel warmers, heat lamps, heating blankets, coffee pots, and terrarium hot rocks do not work.

When you go shopping for beef remember that you’re notlooking for steak to cook for Dinner.  What you want is cheap lean meat. Go to the supermarket on Tuesday, and look for London broil or some other lean cut that is on sale. Why Tuesday? Because the meat that doesn’t sell during the weekend will be on sale on Tuesday. This is because it will expire tomorrow, or soon…  But that’s ok; you’re going to take it home and process the meat with spices.  I bought London broil for a buck fifty a pound this way.

Process:

First wash your hands.  Keep everything clean. 

Cut the meat into strips approximately ½” x ¼” x however long you want.  Try to be consistent with the thickness of the meat slices and trim away any fat.  The worse thing you can do is to cut strips of meat that are long and thin with a thick piece at one end.  Crunch, crunch, crumble, and then… squish.  Yuck-o. 

Wash your hands again.

Using a Pyrex measuring cup, measure approximately 1/4 to 1/3 cup Soy sauce.  Add 3 tablespoons of brown sugar, 2 tablespoons of fine black pepper and one teaspoon of liquid smoke.  Then add one drop of EVOO and stir with a fork.  Microwave for one minute and stir again, this helps the sugar dissolve into the Soy Sauce.  (Do not drink)

Wash your hands yet again.

Place the cut up red meat into a two quart zip lock bag.  Pour in the contents of the Pyrex measuring cup. Next step is to squeeze as much of the air out of the bag as you can.  Then need the bag with your hands in an attempt to mix up the goop and the meat. Make sure that the meat is well coated with goop, and then put the whole mess into the refrigerator until tomorrow.  Waiting 12 hours is fine, 24 hours is best, more than that and you’re just adding to the suspense with out adding much to the flavor.

Then when your all done, wash your hands again.

When the time is right take the bag out of the fridge and pour the contents into a colander (over the sink unless you want a hideous mess) don’t use the extra soy sauce again, that’s probably un-healthful and, well, just plain gross.

Wash your hands.  (duh)

Arrange the meat slices in your dehydrator anyway you like, just don’t let them touch each other.  If you do they will all come out in one piece like pick up sticks coated with glue.  One thing that I like to do it to lay out two racks from the humidifier, as I put the meat on to the rack, I kind of sort them according to thickness.  When done I end up with one rack with meat that has an average thickness less than the other.  I put that one on the uppermost rack, this way you get a more consistent product

Follow the instructions that came with the dehydrator, but don’t get fanatical about it.  I don’t rotate trays except once, if I think about it, usually in the middle of the night.

If you don’t have a dehydrator, go buy one.  They aren’t expensive, just look for the magic sticker on the box…  (As seen on TV) that alone will ensure quality.
If your like me and go through an ungodly amount of jerky (Teen age boys) then you will soon get into a routine of jerky cooking.  It’s like getting the coffee maker ready the night before or taking the garbage out on Monday morning, once a habit like this begins its hard to stop. 

I usually make two batches a week.  Someday, when my boys leave home, a pound of meat would make enough jerky to last me almost a month. But for now we go through about two pounds a week.  What a bunch of pigs.

Hints and tips:

Don’t buy meat that has lots of gristle.  It’s really gross when you get some stuck in your teeth.

Don’t buy meat that has any fat.  Remember we are dehydrating the meat, not cooking it.  Whatever fat is there will be there in the morning.  Yuck-0

Buy a really sharp knife.  Cutting raw meat is not for the common steak knife.

Experiment with other spices.  Substitute portions of the black pepper with other peppers, spices, and stuff.  I also like steak seasoning.

Don’t use any salt.  Some recipes ask for adding salt, I have tried and I find the taste to be vile.

Don’t use the dry method with spices you find at sportsman’s warehouse. This process makes salty leather sound appealing.

Relative humidity makes a big difference in drying time.  Adjust according to your climate.

Store jerky in a place that is unknown, distasteful, or inaccessible to teen age boys.  Example: I keep mine in a jar, in my dresser drawer.

Best time to eat Jerky:

I find that jerky is one of those snack foods that have appropriate and inappropriate eating times.  So here is a helpful list to guide you on Jerky eating etiquette.

Eating Jerky….

Eating Jerky and watching a zombie movie, with the wife, during a scene of corpses eating zombies?  (Appropriate)

Eating Jerky and watching Dirty Jobs, when they are doing a segment on what happens to all the food from Las Vegas hotels?

(Not appropriate)

Eating Jerky while chasing after a rocket that popped the main chute at 11,000 feet in a 10mph wind? (Appropriate)

Eating Jerky and cuddling with the wife in front of the TV while watching The Princess Diaries (2001)?

(Not appropriate)

Eating Jerky while waiting for a cleaning in the dentists office? 

(Not appropriate)

Eating Jerky while driving by a PETA demonstration?

(Very appropriate)

-PF