making jerky

[cats4uandme]

does any one else have one of these? talk about easy. makes quality jerky from ground venison. :eek: :wub:

my buddie brought it down the other day. i had just got 35# of burger from the "uncle got a nice 10 point" deer pictured in the quaote post. i already told the wife to get me one and extra racks for x-mas. :D

simply take thier seasonings and follow the instructions or i preffer my own. mine is the darker. i use soysauce a bit of catsup for a sweet tangy taste brown sugar and some spice. habenaro powder and some tss in the latest batch thats cooking now and mix. refridgerate overnight and fill the caulk gun. squirts right out. tubes or flat sticks attachments. fill the wire rack and put in oven on 200 and crack the door open an 1" and flip a few times every 30 min and in 2 hrs jerky. :D it don't get much easier than that.

[cats4uandme]

the store seasoning is the lighter redder stuff. not as good as mine. 45 people tried them all and preffered mine 100%. theres didn't have that soy jerky flavor. still ok though. i pumped out 4 pounds of burger in a day. makes 2 # jerky. got 4# cooking now that makes another 2# and 4 defrosting. my buddie brought 12# and said jerk it all its last years and im gonna be shooting another deer soon so use it up. :wub: lol, i got some work to do. i even sprinkle cushed pepper flakes on it to give it the pro hot look. ;)

[Big Country01]

I'M STILL KINDA OLD SCOOL WITH MY JERKY I STILL DO IT THE OLD FASHION WAY ,CUT IN THIN STRIPS SEASONED AND PUT IN THE OVEN ON RACKS ON THE LOWEST SETTING AND (500)..lol..HRS LATER THE JEKY IY IS DONE....

[cats4uandme]

this rack works with whole sliced meats too. this kit however makes it from ground meat. chicken pork turkey wild game. i didn't relize you could jerk ground meat till i seen these. i made some sliced beef jerky with the rack but i can't post pics of it. it was all eaten already. :wub:

[Kittyhunter]

Yeah, I used to have one of those. I can't remember where I bought it though. I never tried the oven but a food dehydrator works good too.

[catwacker]

i like making jerky out of ground meat. taste is comparable, and its easier on these old teeth. i built racks for my brinkman smoker. i can smoke 6lbs in about 4 hrs. good stuff. :wub:

[Bobpaul]

Next time you do it, try adding a package of good seasons italian salad dressing mix to your liquids along with your other spices. It works great when I marinate cut strips of venison.

Everyone's loved it and can't figure out the extra flavor.

[fwmud]

Great pics jeremy. You're always finding some new way to make my taste buds come to life.

I have a quicker and easier way to make jerky.

I just post sal something about democrats and there ya go! LMAO!
(course it's tougher than yours)

I have used the dehydrater method too.

[VerotiK]

Im old school too. I use the dehydrator. I dont wanna waste the ground stuff on jerky. Im selfish with my deer burgers :p

[cats4uandme]

im supprized how good it is. ide rather use the ground for jerky and slow smoke the roasts. :cool:

[mmarcum6]

one thing I like to do sometimes is with the marinated strips I take my pepper grinder and crack some fresh pepper over the strips when I put them in the dehydrator. I also use some soy and dale's in my marinade. I do both the ground beef and strips and have had no complaints from either. I think the best was some teriyaki garlic deer jerky I made last year for a friend, He ate the whole gallon ziploc the very first night he had it.

[Bayoubear]

interesting post about the jerky guns, ive never used one but have considered it in the past. I too am old school in my jerky making and will usually make one deer's worth each season. every now and again ill make some pan sausage or link sausage mixed w/ pork fat but just cant seem to bring myself to grind up perfectly good deer meat for burgers. (im not a burger fan anyway) i do all my own butchering too so my scrap pile for the grinder is rather small.

my jerky is labor intensive and takes a long time but my friends and family swear by it. (when i dont make it too spicy for them hahaha)

meat, about 6 to 8 inch strips as thin as i can cut them by hand with the grain when possible. (a tad more work on the teeth this way but it doesnt get crumbly as it can when cut against the grain) at least the backstraps and rear hams worth.

marinade, dark beer, worchestershire, soy, lemon juice, lime juice, crushed garlic. let the meat sit in this a few days in the fridge stirring up once a day.

drain meat allowing to mostly dry, then make a dry rub seasoning. i use sage, red pepper, cajun seasoning, garlic powder, onion powder, whatever you like just not too much salt. (the meat is already cooked via the acidity of the marinade)

poke a toothpick thru the end of each strip and suspend each one on two wires of the rack in your oven. oh, line the bottom of oven with tin foil or youll have a hell of a mess to clean up. once you have all the strips dangling from the wire racks put the oven about as low as it will go and prop the oven door open just a wee bit. i use a folded over dishtowel or such. just enough of a crack to allow the humidity to escape. check it after several hours to obtain the level of dryness you desire and its done.

this recipe is for the more traditional hard dry preserved jerky that will keep indefinitely. if one prefers the soft slim jim in a bag chewy stuff they just dont cook it as long and store the jerky in the fridge.

enjoy....
chad

[rednecksportsman511]

a buddy of mine makes awesome venison jerky, and ive heard of that method, but he uses a dehydrator and solid cuts instead of the ground venison. it takes a couple days for a batch to be ready, though.

[fwmud]

I used to make and sell Jerky to a couple beer bars near here. I used thin hand sliced,cuts of beef.
I'd marinate them for two days in the fridge,then pop in a dehydrator for I think 24 hours.
usually had 3 going all ay once.
Trick is when doing this, you must add some salt to help keep bacteria from growing during the start of dehydration. I'm pretty sure thats in your instrution sheet that comes with the dehydrator/jerky maker.

[cats4uandme]

starting 4 more #'s today. the ground works great. i cant believe how easy it is. been chewing on it every couple hrs. think ill go rotare the batch and grab a dry peice.

[cats4uandme]

Bayoubear that sounds good. i have a big roast that i just may try your style. sounds reel good. i preffer the sliced whole meat jerky but this method is easy and i never knew it would work with ground. my uncle gave me 1/2 the meat from the big buck he just shot and the fool doesn't know how to cook and says deer is to dry and the moron had 4 roasts cut and the rest groung. :eek:

fool

so i got 35# of burger and 2 roasts. i wasn't real happy and asked where the chops and steaks were. thought he kept all them and gave me alll the burger. no. he had it all ground. :crying:

so im making a bunch of jerky with the kit. it aint the only jerk. lol.

[jim]

STOP!!!!! I try and keep myself physically fit and in shape.I just went to the scale and I gained six pounds just reading these posts.No telling what I'd weigh if I actually had some of that jerky!!!!!I can hardly type now because my mouse is all covered with drool.I had a friend that used to make Elk jerky with wine and it was the best I ever had.We used to carry bags of it when we went ice fishing and we ate so much we never had to worry about being pulled through the hole by a big fish.

[Bayoubear]

wow, 35 lbs of burger. dont think ive eaten that much burger in the last ten yrs combined. i did put a jerky gun on my list for santa claus so im sure ill get one next month. will try it with beef first and if i like it okay i may be just a tad more liberal with the scrap pile when butchering out a deer. maybe the neck and front shoulders and trimmings. eeeek... i just dont understand takin a deer to a processor. butchering may be time consuming but its not hard to do and you know for a fact youre getting all your deer meat back.

perhaps im just too cynical but how could any processor when told to make it all hamburger not keep the backstraps or tenderloins for himself? to me tossing those in the grinder is as shameful as takin them.
but.... not to be totally on my soapbox, hahahaha
i do know some people that actually prefer a lot of hamburger meat and while i myself cringe at the thought.... each to his/her own. at least they are feeding their families with it and not collecting horns only leaving the meat to rot.

all this jerky talk has me craving some so i guess ill go get a hind quarter out of the ice chest and get busy... yum yum yum

chad

[Whistler]

I take all my deer to a processor. Our butcher is a custom Hog butcher by trade. He's also a friend and a neighbor. I've also got 3 or 4 of my friends take their deer to him. I'm sure he gives us all the meet off our deer. If he kept a backstrap or roast for himself off every deer he butchers, he'd have to have a freezer the size of his garage. And if he does? Oh well, it's still worth it for me. LOL Last year when I called for my first deer he said he had 34 deer ahead of mine. And that was just in the opening week of gun. Can you imagine how many he does in a year? LOL He charges from 25 bucks up to a max of 45 bucks for processing a deer. Big deer are 45 bucks no matter how you want it done. He'll cut it into any combination of cuts you want for that amount. Standard which is steaks, roasts and burger or just ground, or just the rumps as roasts and the rest ground or however you want it. Last year he also processed and turned a whole deer into summer sausage for us for 40 bucks. I have cut up my own deer before and I just can't see taking the time and making the mess for what I spend. I take it to him, he hangs it for as long as I want him to in the cooler, then a day later I have my deer. I must say he's a private individual and does all this in a home built butcher shop, but he's state approved for business and has his USDA stamps too. He gets inspected 3 or 4 times a year too. Unannounced inspections, so I have a lot of confidence in what he does for me. If he ever quits though, I'll probably buy a commercial grade meatgrinder(about 500 bucks) and do my own. I've used the hand grinders like you mount on a table, and I've watch him put it through his commercial grinder. No comparison at all. LOL I'm spoiled with him as a butcher now. LOL

[Whistler]

Post your deer jerky recipes here (http://www.catfish1.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3112) too. Share it with everyone that way.

[Whistler]

I make mine nearly the same way as Bayou Bear does. My recipe is a bit different, but the process is the same. I bought an oster meat slicer at a yard sale one time for 10 bucks. It saves a ton of time and you get exact same thickness everytime. I slice the meat when it's still about half frozen. I tried the jerky guns before too. Not terribly bad, but I will stick to my way for now. Geez, now I gotta go home and start the process. I gotta make some extra this year for one of our other mods(DH). LOL Maybe!! If it lasts long enough for him to come get it!! LOL

[Dano]

Jeremy, I've always wanted to try one of those ground meat things for jerky. I would have to see and taste it before I put out the cash. I've seen em in Cabela's . I've had a dehydrator for years. Its got 8 trays. Everytime I make it, it get eaten as quick as it get ready. I have to hid the stuff. I'm wanting to get a much bigger dehydrator are another one like I got so I can make more at one time. Usually when I start making it, I will keep dehydrator going
for a few days. make several large bag full and it goes quick. We love that Deer jerky.
Sometimes I settle for using round steak. LOL.

This is how I do it.
I use liquid smoke. mesquite or hickory. Mix one 4oz bottle liquid smoke of choice to about 8-12 oz or so of water to thin it out some, depends on taste. 12 oz of water might be too much. I just eyeball the mix/water. Couple oz's of Worcestershire sauce and a little Tabasco. Sometimes I leave out the Tabasco on every other batch for the wife. I make up enough mixture to fill up a big glass bowl I put meat in to soak. I cut meat bout a 1/4 inch thick in strips and pieces. After soaking first batch for 2 or so hours I spread meat on counter and add more meat to mixture to soak over night.
When one batch is ready, I put on another until I run out of meat or get tire of making it.
LOL. I shake garlic powder, onion power, a little Cajun season, sometimes red pepper and a lot of course black pepper on both sides of meat. Sometimes I add very very little season salt on one side. That liquid smoke. has plenty of salt in it so if adding salt to meat, be careful not to over salt it. Depends on ones taste. Most times I add no salt. Put on machine. Takes 8 or so hours for my machine to make the jerky. It will last 6 months, so they say but around my house I'm doing good to keep a batch over night. LOL. Goes as fast as I make it. Anyway, its great to snack on. Bite off a piece and chew for a while. Its good to us. Dang I need a deer. Beef just gets too expensive the way we go through the jerky.
End up with about a 1/3 of the weight you start out with after jerky is done.

[Dano]

Whistler, I hear ya on letting the butcher process it. They sure do a nice job and its much easier after a day of hunting and short on time. Deer also taste better if you can let it hang in freezer for a few days. Best way to go.
Only thing around here the price of having it process has gotten out of hand. Mim $100.
and more if you have a lot of sausage or hamburger made, maybe summer sausage made, it can get up to $200.
I've done several deer myself and its a lot of work when only meat tools is a knife and hand grander. LOL. Wish I had a meat slicer. I haven't hunted in a while but had hine quarters's given to me and a half deer last year. Since I made jerky out of most all of it, I just cut it up myself and save the cash. Bout the only thing I do with deer now is jerky, sometimes fry up back strap or throw a shoulder on the pit for a day.
I really want a deer for making jerky.

[steveg442]

I use a dehydrator. I also add some liquid smoke in with my seasonings for extra flavor.

[blackwaterkatz]

I just posted my recipe for venison jerky. I like to slice the meat while it is semi-frozen, either with an electric filet knife, or a meat slicer. When I make a batch or two, I keep quiet about it until I'm ready to share it, otherwise it will be gone in a matter of hours.

[ShilohRed]

Man that jerky makes me hungry... LOL
I have the SS shooter from caballas. It works good. And a smoke that I can also do jerky on. It will hold 8 racks that are 18"X18" I hope to get one in a few days and all but the backstrap will be in jerky..
Anyone make turkey jerky?
Bryan get it made. And I might trade a few crappie from feelfoot for some..LOL

PEte

[Bayoubear]

wow, what a deal. if that were available here im sure id use him at least once a year for my jerky meat, takes me forever. reading back over my post i can see it can be taken in the negative for processors. i do a very little processing myself for family and a few friends, my fee is one of the back hams. not my intent to slight the hard workin guys that do it large scale. was a little irked at someone saturday that gave me half a deer but wanted to take it to the butcher first.

unless there is one of which im unaware, our local processors charge a lot more than yours do, grind hamburger, chili meat, stew meat or cross cut the whole ham with a band-saw. ive never seen a locally processed backstrap come back anywhere near as long as they should be either. take the extra five minutes and get the whole thing.

the "shameful" comment was a tongue-in-cheek way of poking fun at whats (strictly my opinion) a terrible waste of the best cut of meat from the deer.
*would you use a 100 dollar bottle of scotch to light your campfire?

i really hope i didnt offend any processors here as in no way was that my intent.

sorry for any confusion,
happy fishing,
chad

[cats4uandme]

have no fear dano. they work good. they sell em at walmart and the jerky tastes good. just had some more. can't stop eating it.

[Whistler]

Bayou Bear, I didn't mean to imply that your post was negative. Sorry about that if it sounded that way. Dano, take a drive out in the country and talk to some of the locals at one of the many country stores you'll see. Somewhere not too far away they'll put you in touch with someone like my butcher. I know of 3 here that would do it for me, but he's been my butcher for nearly 10 years now. So I'll stick with him til he quits doing it. Pete, I didn't get to it tonight, but soon the whole house will smell like jerky. LOL Joanne loves it too. She always hides some for herself. Shhh! I always seem to find it somehow! LOL

[derbycitycatman]

Yall got me hungry now. I wish the processors were that cheap around here. They wont touch anything for under 75 anymore. I paid my first year hunting and have been butchering my own deer ever since. I like to think of it as part of hunting.
My jerky recipe changes from batch to batch. I made my first batch last year and it lasted about 3 weeks for a whole deer. Everything got made into jerky except the tenderloins. For my jerky recipe, I like to marinade with worcesther? sauce, soy sauce, salt, country bobs, and whatever else sounds good thats around. I also use solid cuts as thin as I can cut em. Before I lay it on the dehydrator I like to give it a generous garlic salting. Let it go for 24 hrs and its done. Bad thing is the first batch is gone before the second batch is even cooking.

[Bayoubear]

one thing ive done to help make the jerky last is to increase the cayenne pepper. not too hot you wont eat it, but warm enough that eating the whole bag at once isnt a good idea. i also make a "nuclear" hot batch that i take a few pieces with me up in the deer stand on cold mornings. one bite every so often really does help. i dont think it actually warms me up but rather takes my mind off of being cold. hahahahahaa

[Whistler]

i dont think it actually warms me up but rather takes my mind off of being cold.

LOL, Yep, that would definately take your mind off the cold!! LOL But the smoke and fire might just scare all the deer out of the area too!! LOL

[cats4uandme]

24 hrs,lol. i make this ground jerky in 1 1/2 hres per batch. took a bag to work today and it prob 3/4 # was gobbled up in 30 min by 3 guts. im telling ya i prefer the sliced jerky but as fast as this is. shoot im hooked. did 14#of ground in 3 days work.

[cats4uandme]

keeps your mind off being cold. hehehe. the new batch im making will warm ya up. added two # ground deer. soy sauce, b-sugar, garlic, 3 oz of habenaro sauce and gonna top with crushed habenaro flakes. my buddie said he wanted some hot and he gave my 12#of ven burger so hot he' :D ll get.

[on_the_fly]

ive been making jerky for about 5 years now. i will only use deer burger an i have a meat slicer i cut up my turkey with. i use the jurky cauking gun on the burger an well turkey is just thin slices. i have made my own cures befor but after all these years doing i still prefer ( Hi Mountain jerky cure) they have many dif flavers but i only use 2 i use their (cajon blend) for my burger an ( wild turkey burbon blend) for my turkey. every one says they love it an 2 friends bring me their deer every year to jerky for them. i didnt know if anyone else uses this but all of the store bought cures i have ever tryed they all seem to do best with dubble sesoning per lbs of meat. flavors comes out so much richer. an hi mountain cures has a web site if you look i think thats how i ordered last time.

[cats4uandme]

just did a big roast the old school way. i made 4 different marinades to try and focus in on the best and then perfect it. they are all good. the taste test is tonight. gonna have a buddie try em all and see what he thinks.

sliced em thin while froze. i like the one with soy s, steak sauce, a couple texas select seasonings ,b-sugar , onion and garlic salt. and lemon lime juice,has a great glazed jerkey flavor.

[H2O Mellon]

Jeremy,

Nice post, I'm hungry now. I'll send ya another Abu 6000 for some jerkey! :p

[cats4uandme]

hehehe. sounds good to me. looks as if the steak sauce one gets to be the one i perfect. the more i eat the better it tastes. the hot one was good too. had soy, steak sauce, honey, some tss seasonings, and garlic salt onionsalt, and a spoon of habenaro sauce from tss.