I started lifting weights a few months ago, and have ever since been attempting to consume the oft-suggested gram of protein per lb. of bodyweight per day. To accomplish this feat, I decided to start making - and eating - a ton of beef jerky, for the following reasons:
1. That is a fuckton of protein to eat every day. Seriously. About four dozen eggs' worth.
2. I am not about to start quaffing whey shakes morning, noon, and night - real food is way better
3. Jerky is DELICIOUS!!!
Beef
Marinade
(I'll have some real jerky recipies for you down the road - but as you might suspect, pretty much anything that's salty, spicy, sweet, or a little bit of each will work for this.)
Procedure:
The first recipes I read suggested using brisket, so that's what I use. You end up with very nice long chewy strips of jerky, but about half of it is fat that winds up being thrown out. I might give a different cut a try one of these days...
If you're using brisket - and buying a whole brisket, not one of those little shriveled-up abominations from the supermarket, you'll have some work to do. Each brisket seems to have two main pieces of lean meat, with a thick slab of fat one one side and another in between. Start by removing the easy-to-reach fat:
Then begin to separate the top chunk of lean meat from the rest of the brisket:
Once the pieces are separated, remove the fatty slabs. I'm a bit more wasteful than I'd like to be, but practice will eventually make perfect.
You end up with a lot of fat. I throw it out, because I can't think of anything else to do with it. I'm not about to turn my apartment into a rendering plant...
Now slice the meat. I like to go across the grain (this makes the jerky a bit more tender), but going parallel works just fine. Use a long, sharp knife for fastest progress and best results. Aim for 1/8" slices, and definitely stay under 1/4."
Toss it in a bowl, and pour on your marinade. I used a mixture of light and dark Chinese soy sauce, chili-garlic sauce, sesame oil, ginger, garlic, powdered star anise, black pepper, and a little bit of sugar. Anytime you use ginger or garlic, it's a good idea to puree everything very well, so it can all soak into and stick to your meat. A relatively small amount of marinade goes a long way. I'll have suggested portions for you one of these days, but I'll need to pick up a scale first - and I have another upcoming purchase that will be documented here which takes precedence.
The meat from a 10 lb. brisket fits nicely in a gallon-sized Ziploc bag. You don't need to let it sit long - a few hours is enough.
I threw the bag in the freezer for a week - both due to my schedule, and to see if it made any difference in the finished product. But the visions I've had of a freezer full of meatbags ready for drying will never be fulfilled. Freezing and thawing draw a lot of moisture out of the meat, and result in jerky that's not quite as chewy as ideal. You can even see the difference in the bag:
Into the strainer...
...and onto the rack.
I like to dry jerky at my mom's house - she has a pair of convection ovens with thermostats that go down to 135, while I just have a basic range that won't go any cooler than 170.
Even with the convection oven, you'll need to prop the oven door open a bit to let the steam escape. Jerky is not steamed. You'll also need to rotate the shelves and flip over the meat strips at least once during the drying process - more than once with a standard oven. The fact that the meat was frozen and thawed made it apt to fall apart a little bit when I turned it, but I was careful and didn't lose very much. The picture below shows it about two hours in, or halfway through the drying process. I didn't cut the strips with incredible consistency, so some parts dry much faster than others. This does not cause any problems.
Foil is essential (if you're using a standard oven, the elemt will burn through it a bit, though):
It shrinks a lot during cooking!
Be sure to let the jerky cool and air out at room temperature for half an hour before putting it in a bag.
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