I need suggestions for making easy beef jerky.

[Woodland Woman]

I bought some breakfast steaks for a good deal and want to dry them but I have never dehydrated meat before.

 

[valmom]

I just slice it really as thin as you can get it, marinade it overnight. I use a soy sauce base with ginger, garlic powder, and tabasco. Then lay it out on cookie sheets and put it in the oven as low as your oven will go. I don't think mine gets low enough to suit me, but it works for the most part. If I could get 150 degrees, I'd prefer it, but 200 is as low as it gets. Then just keep the door of the oven open a bit to let the moisture escape, and let it dry. Keep testing, and take it out before you think it is hard- mine keeps hardening as it cools. Usually about 3 hours or so, for me.

Good luck, it is great for snacking on!

 

[noobiechickenlady]

Yep, what valmom said. Use your favorite meat marinade, preferably one with some acid (vinegar, lemon juice). Only wanted to add - dry it until it feels like leather almost, you don't want it flimsy, but not crunchy either. I left some in the dehydrator overnight (about 4 hours too long!) and it came out very crunchy. It was very tasty, it just crumbled when we ate it. Ended up using it in soups, just crumbled a little into the liquid.

 

[Woodland Woman]

How thin should the meat be? These are cut into breakfast steaks which are thin as far as a steak goes but I am not sure if it will be thin enough.

 

[big brown horse]

I think that has to do with preference. I like my jerky a bit thicker...it takes a bit longer to dry out, but I dont like hard wafer thin jerky. I would say about 1/4 inch thick or so.

 

[noobiechickenlady]

And I'm on the opposite side of the spectrum, I like mine real thin. Like presliced sandwich meat.
If you do slice it up more than it already is, cut it a bit thicker than the jerky you normally eat. It will shrink a bit. Or just cut the steaks into narrow strips and have jerky sticks instead.

 

[freemotion]

Never made jerky here, but as an avid recipe reader.....don't you have to use a lot of salt in the marinate to preserve the meat?

I did make training treats when my dog was a puppy, though, when the normal stuff made him sick, and I discovered raw food was ok for him. But I wasn't gonna carry raw meat in my pocket, so I cut up an eye of round roast and dried it. Kept the treats in the fridge, since I didn't salt it.

So, no salt? Your marinade sounds very yummy, valmom, makes me want to try some jerky. Or throw that on the grill!

 

[noobiechickenlady]

You need a total of around a teaspoon of salt per lb. Soy sauce typically has lots of salt, as does italian dressing, at least the commercial brands. For that matter, most commercial seasonings & marinades have salt. So if you are using low sodium seasonings, or making your own from scratch, yes, put about a teaspoon per lb of meat.

Also, you'll need to make sure the meat gets to an internal temp of 145 or higher to kill the nasties.

It usually disappears too quickly to spoil around here, so I don't typically worry about the salt.

 

[freemotion]

Oh, thanks, it doesn't even cross my mind to use commercial mixes, so I often forget about the salt.

 

[Beekissed]

My mom uses Braggs Amino, garlic, pepper for hers. The thinner the jerky, the sooner it gets done!

I think you should send some out to us SSers for quality assurance purposes....wouldn't want to eat tainted meats or anything!