Posted: 10/21/2009 10:42:50 AM EDT
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I was cleaning out the chest freezer to make room for an opening day deer I harvested and realized I had 2 roasts from one of the deer harvested from last season. They had a small amount of freezer burn so I decided to make a batch of deer jerky out of them for long term storage and to add to some of my vaccum sealed meals that I make for camping and backpacking as well as BOB's.
I started with 2 roasts. 
Then I sliced them into 1/8' -1/4' strips. If the meat is slightly frozen this proccess is much easier to do. 
All pieces were put in a large bowl to be ready for marinading. The marinade I use for a basic jerky is Kosher salt, worschtershire sauce, Dale's seasoning, seasonsalt, and a sweeter style BBQ sauce. I add these ingrediants to equal approximatly 1 1/2 cups and then add water to increase to enough volume to cover the amount of meat I am marinading. I leave in the refridgerator overnight for the flavors to infuse into the meat. Almost any items can be used for flavor, but I would caution against using oil based products like sald dressing as the oil does not dry well and can leave a residue on the jerky when it is finished. 
I then drain and pat dry the meat and lay in the oven racks, making sure that they are not overlapped and there is enough room for good airflow. I set my oven at 170degrees, and leave the door slightly open to allow the moisture and steam to escape during drying. Please remember that this is drying and not cooking so maintaning a low consistent heat will be very important. This batch took about 9 hours. This is a fewhours into the drying. 
The final product ready to be eaten or stored. The best way to check is to find the thickest piece you have and try to tear it apart, if there is moist or soft parts on the inside you may need a few more hours. These are hard dried for longer storage and for future additions to vaccum sealed meals. You can reduce the time and have a moist jerky but it will not keep as long. 
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| So, what have you noticed that is different between making deer jerky and beef jerky? So far my jerky forays have stayed in the beef realm, but I have 40 lbs of elk on the way, and 25lbs of bear, all of which is slotted to become jerky. Any pointers you may have would be great! Thanks for the post. |
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I call bullshit on your long term storage of jerky.
If it's any good it last just hours or a few days at best. 
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Attention reloaders....they're not pills, they're not heads or tips, they're called bullets. Also acceptable are the specific bullet type. e.g. soft point, hollow point, fmj, et cetera.
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Originally Posted By PATCH5:
So, what have you noticed that is different between making deer jerky and beef jerky? So far my jerky forays have stayed in the beef realm, but I have 40 lbs of elk on the way, and 25lbs of bear, all of which is slotted to become jerky. Any pointers you may have would be great! Thanks for the post. The meat is leaner so you may find that it dries quicker than beef. |
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Awesome guide. I have been thinking about trying this method with a Box Fan (minus using the air filters, I would just string it up above the fan on some paracord)
http://www.instructables.com/id/Box-Fan-Jerky/ |
| Great post I know this will not help you out now but if you want the meat more tender soak it on buttermilk! If you don't have buttermilk just mix one cup milk to one TBS white vinegar per pound of meat it works great the vinegar does something to the fat on the meat after a day soaking in it you can pull unwanted fat by had off the meat it does not leave a vinegar taste to it if you use what I told you to use. The rest of the meat comes out tender as can be if you jerk the meat before you dry it you will see how tender you get the meat be for warn it only takes a little jerk anything more the meat tears in half like paper. |
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Originally Posted By cutlass1972:
It would be a LOT safer if you at least got some tender quick. You can get tender quick at southern states or meijers in the salt isle. It has salt, sugar, and sodium nitrate. I was wondering if you could clarify your post for me. By "a lot safer" do you mean with alternate ingrediants? I have done jerky many different ways but never had a batch spoil or go bad yet. My hard dried jerky I have had vaccum sealed for a year or more and still tasted fine. Is there some reason as to using tender quick? If it has sugar I personally wouldn't use it as sugar will be the first thing to attract insects and tends to leave a sticky residue on jerky. Just my experience but would like to know what your results have been. |
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Originally Posted By cutlass1972: It would be a LOT safer if you at least got some tender quick. You can get tender quick at southern states or meijers in the salt isle. It has salt, sugar, and sodium nitrate. I think there's plenty of sodium for it to be "safe" assuming he's getting it dry enough. I would refrigerate it in that ziplock until you're ready to vacuum seal it. |
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Originally Posted By georgiagun:
Originally Posted By cutlass1972:
It would be a LOT safer if you at least got some tender quick. You can get tender quick at southern states or meijers in the salt isle. It has salt, sugar, and sodium nitrate. I was wondering if you could clarify your post for me. By "a lot safer" do you mean with alternate ingrediants? I have done jerky many different ways but never had a batch spoil or go bad yet. My hard dried jerky I have had vaccum sealed for a year or more and still tasted fine. Is there some reason as to using tender quick? If it has sugar I personally wouldn't use it as sugar will be the first thing to attract insects and tends to leave a sticky residue on jerky. Just my experience but would like to know what your results have been. While yes, there might be enough sodium to pickle a possum in there, and yes sugar may in large enough quantities attract insects, the sodium nitrate will ward off the extra tiny bugs that can do the most damage. I think most of us have made jerky in the method you are speaking of and not gotten sick, and for the most part we probably could continue to do so without harm. however the addition of some pink salt http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_Powder#1 will make your jerky stay a nice reddish color and fend off even the worst of the bacteria including the spores that crap out the dreaded botulism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botulism pink salt is sodium nitrate nitrate with a pink dye to keep you from mixing it up with the regular salt (in large quantities it can be very bad for you, so you don't want to go using it like table salt on accident). It can be bought from real fermented sausage supply companies such as sausagemaker.com I would not use tender quick myself as it does contain sugar which lends a sweet flavor that I do not want, and as you stated could in high enough concentrations attract insects. I use pink salt #1 which is mostly sodium, I only recommend tender quick as it contains sodium nitrate and a lot of people are not dedicated enough to order sodium nitrate. long story short, people have been using sodium nitrate and sodium nitrite for many years to preserve meat (country ham, prosciutto, corned beef, jerky, etc..) and while without it your jerky may be safeish for a while, but I would not eat it after a few months without refrigeration (unless I was starving that is). |
| My experience, I have a convection oven, which is basically a fan and it will cut the drying time down to about 4.5-5 hours. I also add a shot or two of wisky to mine. I ussually get about a 1-1.5 out of 5 pounds of deer meat. And it is ussually gone in less than a week, its addictive. |
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I found a ziplock bag in an old hunting coat with some jerky I made over 5 years ago. Still good to go! (or at least it was . . .
I ate it!  )
Hessian-1 
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Cool stuff. Need to get you a vacuum sealer. You motivate me to dehydrate some I have in the freezer now. 
We need a how-to on how to dehydrate "old school" pre electric days. |
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I put some of mine in mason jars and used the accessory/jars fitting on the vacuum sealer to make it more convenient to get to. It makes it almost 'too' convenient....
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| I've done jerky like the OP for years with no ill effects. I call poo on the use of nitrates. Salt and drying is the age-old way to cure and it works. Besides, nitrates is a known migraine trigger. |
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Regarding the poster who mentioned using bear meat for jerky - be very cautious. Bear meat is something that needs to be well cooked to kill parasites like trichinosis. The drying process will not kill parasites. I personally would not eat bear meat jerky. |
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FWIW, it does not make sense, to me, to soak a product in water prior to starting a process to remove water.
http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_10_19/647851_Trip_your_Trigger_jerky_recipe_and_Pic_Tutorial_.html TRG |
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| I've heard that freezing the meat 1st. will kill parasites? Is this true?, And then it will make slicing easier as has been posted. I agree with using a cheap slicer for thickness uniformity. And I like to toss in O2 absorbers into the ziplocks. And store in cool dark enviroment. |
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Originally Posted By BOYSCOUT4LIFE:
I've heard that freezing the meat 1st. will kill parasites? Is this true? No, , And then it will make slicing easier as has been posted. Yes. I agree with using a cheap slicer for thickness uniformity. No. I own a 'cheap slicer'. A sharp knife is much faster and safer. And I like to toss in O2 absorbers into the ziplocks. And store in cool dark enviroment. Paper sacks are better to store jerky. Plastic holds in moisture. It never lasts more than a week around my house. TRG |
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"Just cultivate a polite detached superiority. " ~BigEasySnow
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| you guys with a woodburning fire place can do this while burning. fab up some racks and drip pans and place them ontop of your stove or hanging from your mantle and the fuel is free. unless you pay for wood. |
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Originally Posted By georgiagun:
Originally Posted By medicine_man:
I'm trying this out today. Thanks for the How-to, I'll post an update when it's done You could also send me some..... 
It turned out great! thanks for the idea, but it's not looking like there's going to be a whole lot to send out, it seems to be disappearing fast |
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