Smoked Beef Jerky
Smoked Beef Jerky
Who doesn’t like beef jerky. Vegans. Let me start this over. Who loves beef jerky and is sick of paying $20-$30/lb for it? Me, god dammit! Most of the time, the jerky isn’t even that good. Well, I never pass up a good sale. When eye of round is on sale for $3.99/lb, I hop on that shit. This is the one thing that this mostly shitty cut is great for, and that is beef jerky. The other options you can use are top round and sirloin tip. The most important thing with beef jerky is to use a super lean cheap cut. And that is definitely eye of round. A cut like chuck is too tough and fatty. A good rule of thought is that if the cut you choose is good for rare sliced roast beef, then it’s good for jerky.Most people don’t have a deli slicer. If you do, throw the beef in the freezer for a couple hours to firm up. Then slice on your slicer somewhere between 1/8”-1/4” thick. You can also use a sharp fillet or carving knife. The beef has to be semi-frozen for this to work. If not, it will be like slicing meat jello. If these aren’t options for you, the person to talk to is your butcher. But let’s converse before you go any farther. And for my next rant, let’s talk about etiquette at a meat counter when it comes to slicing raw meat like this. Ask your butcher if they even have a deli slicer. Not everyone does. Ask them if they are able to thinly slice beef for jerky. Everyone will tell you to call ahead and place an order. Why? The butchers will also have to semi-freeze the beef in order to slice it that thin; whether by hand or slicer. So if you’re expecting beef properly sliced on the spot, it’s not gonna happen. Learn this. Place an order in the morning, pick it up in the afternoon. If every customer understood this, we butchers would be a lot less angry. End of rant.The marinade for the jerky is pretty straight forward. Most marinades for beef jerky are soy sauce based, some type of juice like pineapple(natural tenderizer), and black pepper. There’s countless other seasonings you can add to flavor the beef. I think at least 24 hour of marinating works best in penetrating the meat. When ready to smoke, place the beef on the wire racks of your smoker, making sure to minimally overlap.Smoking jerky is a slow process. Since we are drying out the beef through smoking, we will not use the water pan in the smoker. No extra moisture. I like to preheat my smoker to 250 degrees, let the wood chips smoke for 10 minutes, place the racks in the smoker, then drop the heat to 200 degrees. I maintain the temp between 180-200 degrees for about 5 hours. The jerky is ready when it can bend in half, but doesn’t crack.The jerky will keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a month. Since we are using minimal preservatives in making the jerky, it doesn’t have a year shelf life like most of the jerky you find prepackaged. If you have a vacuum sealer, vacuum seal bags of beef jerky and keep them in the freezer until ready for consumption. If I may go on one more rant about jerky, it’s that jerky in a food dehydrator or in the oven is lame. Using liquid smoke is lame. Real jerky, in my opinion, having made thousands and thousands of lbs of it, is smoked. No comparison. You are fooling yourself. Smoke it. Smoke. It. End of snobby elitist jerky rant.
Equipment
- Electric Smoker
Ingredients
- 3 lbs eye of round roast fat completely trimmed; sliced between 1/8”-1/4” thick
- 3/4 cup soy sauce
- 3/4 cup pineapple juice
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 1 tbsp black pepper
- 2 tsp sea salt
- 2 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 3/4 tsp pink curing salts
Wood Chips
- 1/2 applewood
- 1/2 cherrywood
Instructions
- Mix together the marinade ingredients.
- If you have a deli slicer, throw the beef in the freezer for 2 hours to firm it up. Slice between 1/8”-1/4” thick. You can also use a sharp fillet or carving knife. Or ask you butcher. But we’ll talk about that etiquette later.
- Marinate the beef in a gallon sized storage bag for 24 hours.
- When ready to smoke, place the beef in a single layer on each rack, making sure to minimally overlap.
- Preheat your smoker to 250 degrees. Let the wood chips light on fire and smoke for 10 minutes. Place the racks in the smoker. Turn the temp down to 200 degrees. Maintain the temp between 180-200 degrees. The jerky is ready when it is dry and bends in half, but doesn’t crack. This process will take up to 5 hours.
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