Want to do first time jerky

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clifish

Master of the Pit
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May 25, 2019
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Long Island, NY
Getting sick of the $23-$35 per pound of jerky, I want to do some. First question is what meat? Locally I can get top round or london broil on sale this week. Does it need cure #1 to the normal calculated ratios? Otherwise there are tons of recipes here that I found. I can smoke them or use the dehydrator? Any thoughts or direction would be helpful.
 
Getting sick of the $23-$35 per pound of jerky, I want to do some. First question is what meat? Locally I can get top round or london broil on sale this week. Does it need cure #1 to the normal calculated ratios? Otherwise there are tons of recipes here that I found. I can smoke them or use the dehydrator? Any thoughts or direction would be helpful.
Me too, in going to do this as well.
 
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Getting sick of the $23-$35 per pound of jerky, I want to do some. First question is what meat? Locally I can get top round or london broil on sale this week. Does it need cure #1 to the normal calculated ratios? Otherwise there are tons of recipes here that I found. I can smoke them or use the dehydrator? Any thoughts or direction would be helpful.
Yeah cure #1 to the normal calculated ratio will work for that and keep it all safe.

As long as you have the cure#1 calculated correctly you can use any recipe out there. Just know that you probably don't want to go over 2% salt for the weight of the meat you are using (so 160oz of meat = 3.2oz of salt max). I mention this because many recipes are bad and if you are adding more salt than 2% for your amount of meat then you are going to have a salt-lick block instead of jerky haha. I personally would aim for about 1.7% of salt.

You can smoke or dehydrate. Smoke temp don't go over 200F smoker temp and go until it is slightly starting to break when bending. At that point it will continue to lose moisture. If it is easily breaking... that is too much dehydration and it will get crumbly rather than be jerky.

Finally. If you can get 95% ground meat or leaner you can also make jerky from it AND the jerky made from the ground meat is softer on the teeth. Just an idea for you to kick around. Especially if they will grind your top round and London broil for you for free :)
Ground jerky is the only way I'm doing jerky from now on. It's so much faster and easier to deal with to make amazing jerky.

I hope all this info helps :)
 
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Eye of the round is a good cut. OFG jerky is my fav

i on page 2 is a excel i made that calculates all the ingredients all you have to do is enter the weight

disco disco for the original recipe!

I smoke mine on my pellet grill
 
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I've been making a good amount of jerky since I got my dehydrator in November. I found 1/4 tsp per lb of #1 somewhere posted and I have stuck to that with great success. I've been getting Milanesa, which is presliced bottom round at wallyword and it has been great to use. It's going for $6.59/lb here and is well worth it. Only problem is that I can't keep it around long enough between me and my kids....
 
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Thanks, how are you recovering so far?
Thanks for asking. Doin ok. Pain isn’t bad so long as I keep my foot elevated. no weight bearing is the thing that pretty much makes everything impossible. Been rolling around in my office chair which is better than crutches. Friday I get the stit out and new cast of some sort. Not sure if its gonna be a removable boot or fiberglass. I’ll post up after I get home. Reading a book every couple days.
 
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Thanks for asking. Doin ok. Pain isn’t bad so long as I keep my foot elevated. no weight bearing is the thing that pretty much makes everything impossible. Been rolling around in my office chair which is better than crutches. Friday I get the stit out and new cast of some sort. Not sure if its gonna be a removable boot or fiberglass. I’ll post up after I get home. Reading a book every couple days.
Pro tip - get some wheels like this for your office chair and u don't risk marking up any of your floors and you an glide effortlessly :D


I found a sweet deal on some armless office chairs that replace my kitchen nook chairs and put these wheels on all of them. I have these wheels on my other two actual office working chairs too.

Way cheaper than buying floor covers that are only so big and these things work on any surface and for far less than alternative options!!!

I hope this helps you roll around everywhere and keep the floors and carpet from wearing out :)
 
Pro tip - get some wheels like this for your office chair and u don't risk marking up any of your floors and you an glide effortlessly :D


I found a sweet deal on some armless office chairs that replace my kitchen nook chairs and put these wheels on all of them. I have these wheels on my other two actual office working chairs too.

Way cheaper than buying floor covers that are only so big and these things work on any surface and for far less than alternative options!!!

I hope this helps you roll around everywhere and keep the floors and carpet from wearing out :)
I actually bought some of those killer wheels a while back. PRICELESS! I would lie some new dining chairs, but I’m not taking that up with my wife…just yet. I appreciate your assist!
 
I actually bought some of those killer wheels a while back. PRICELESS! I would lie some new dining chairs, but I’m not taking that up with my wife…just yet. I appreciate your assist!

Nice, so you already know the simplicity and magic of these wheels! hhahah.

Oh yeah I hear you on chairs. I ran across a place that had the amazing Steelcase Leap v1 chairs that were modified for a call center (modified to have no arm rests). I think I got them for $10 a pop which was like WOW!!! So I upgraded my kitchen nook chairs to be these amazingly comfortable chairs and I put those wheels on them.

If you ever get a chance to sit in a Steelcase Leap v1 or v2 you will understand why $10 a pop was so amazing. Steelcase Leap chairs are by far the best office chairs I have ever sat in and I have sat in a variety of high end ones. I'm Steelcase for life, down with Herman Miller chairs! :D
Also I feel bad for anyone who falls into the trap thinking a gaming chair could ever come close to a great office chair.
 
Great!! Just ordered the wheels. We are replacing our carpet floors with LVP floors in the next month or so, I was wondering what to do about my office chair.
 
Great!! Just ordered the wheels. We are replacing our carpet floors with LVP floors in the next month or so, I was wondering what to do about my office chair.
These kinds of wheels will do the trick nicely. Just make sure they work for your chair and you are good to go! :D
 
A little late to the game here but I've made hundreds of pounds of jerky from London broil. It has been my go to cut for almost a decade. I used to dry it in my electric smoker on one of the lowest heat settings with no smoke. Couple years back I bought a 12 tray (I think) Cabella's dehydrator and haven't gone back. I use a jerky slicer to cut the meat now but in the past I would freeze the meat overnight and let it thaw for about two hours to cut with a butcher knife or a meat slicer. Also... trim off ALL of the fat that you can it gets kinda gross when you dry it. For marinades I use an Alton Brown classic jerky marinade, a Chinese five spice teriyaki as well as a spicy sriracha home made fire sauce type thing that I came up with through experimentation. The first two recipes can be found with a search of "northwest edible life how to make jerky at home". None of these recipes use curing salts. I'm sure there are differing opinions on this but I won't put them in my meats.
 
A little late to the game here but I've made hundreds of pounds of jerky from London broil. It has been my go to cut for almost a decade. I used to dry it in my electric smoker on one of the lowest heat settings with no smoke. Couple years back I bought a 12 tray (I think) Cabella's dehydrator and haven't gone back. I use a jerky slicer to cut the meat now but in the past I would freeze the meat overnight and let it thaw for about two hours to cut with a butcher knife or a meat slicer. Also... trim off ALL of the fat that you can it gets kinda gross when you dry it. For marinades I use an Alton Brown classic jerky marinade, a Chinese five spice teriyaki as well as a spicy sriracha home made fire sauce type thing that I came up with through experimentation. The first two recipes can be found with a search of "northwest edible life how to make jerky at home". None of these recipes use curing salts. I'm sure there are differing opinions on this but I won't put them in my meats.
Curious what the jerky slicer is. Can you post a pic or a link? Thanks
 
We just started some jerky in the dehydrators. Bought the prime rib jerky seasoning from Owen's BBQ. Sliced up the bottom round roast Thursday night and started it marinating. Normally we use a recipe from my wife's stepmom and use venison.
20220305_143721.jpg


I'm excited to try it!

Ryan
 
Curious what the jerky slicer is. Can you post a pic or a link? Thanks
id love to post a photo but I don't know how to make that happen here.... if you google "cabella's jerky slicer" it seems to be the first thing that shows up.
 
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