Wet or Dry Cure for Dried Beef?

[Scott Eisenbraun]

Been hungry for decent dried beef. The grocery store stuff in the jar is terrible. I found Bearcarver's thread on dried beef. He uses a dry cure, which I don't have any experience with yet. I noticed that someone else had used the recipe, but used Pop's wet cure. Is there any advantage to using a dry cure instead of wet for the same amount of time to penetrate the meat?

 

[pc farmer]

I dry cure mine. I dry my dried beef alot. Takes around 24 hours to get the meat to where I like it, that being said I dont want to add more moisture from a wet cure.

 

[Scott Eisenbraun]

I dry cure mine. I dry my dried beef alot. Takes around 24 hours to get the meat to where I like it, that being said I dont want to add more moisture from a wet cure.

Do you leave smoke on it the whole 24 hrs?

 

[pc farmer]

12 hours smoker time, then in the oven

 

[Scott Eisenbraun]

Thanks, guys. I don't know why a dry cure made me nervous. Just another process that seems more complicated than it is.

 

[Scott Eisenbraun]

I have a 20 year old box of TQ and a bunch of Cure #1.

 

[nanuk]

I made some using TQ dry cure... it was AWESOME!

 

[buzzy]

If u follow Bearcarvers recipe u will get awesome results. Don’t forget about injection solution in the middle if over 2” thick. I use his recipe every time an it gets alot of compliments. Only takes a couple of minutes every day to flip bags when curing. Make it 1 time an u will be hooked