Wednesday, February 14, 2024

Kitchen experiment

Not long ago, I bought a couple of small bags of beef jerky at a Dollar Tree store. The contents of each bag barely covered my palm. And I've noticed for some time that large bags are pretty expensive.

So, last week, Mrs. Paco and I took the plunge and made some beef jerky at home. After reviewing several YouTube videos (or was it several hundred?), we found a recipe that looked good, and we had seen a variety of preparation modes, including using the dehydration functions on Instant Pot and in our large toaster oven, so we bought a tray of thin eye-of-round steaks and went to work. I cut the steaks into strips, and Mrs. Paco made a marinade consisting of Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, pineapple juice, some onion powder, garlic salt and regular salt and a little black pepper. The meat soaked overnight in the marinade, and we made two batches the following day, one in the Instant Pot and one in the toaster oven. They both came out great. Here's a photo of the finished product (not all of it, of course; just a couple of strips).


These things were delicious, and my self control was put to the extreme test; clean living prevailed, however, and I managed to make the jerky last three or four days. Next time, I believe I'll add a dash of chili powder.

Oh, and these things are really good in a yeast roll or biscuit.

4 comments:

  1. Looks good!

    I've wanted to do that for a while but I balked at cutting the meat thin enough.
    I never thought of getting thin sliced meat. I see it all the time at the grocery store and avoid it, I like ma meat thick!

    Talk about a 'well duh!' moment.

    I work at a plastics manufacturing place, when some lucite or other clear plastic does not meet specs, whether dimensionally or with some minor scratches, I take some home. I have quite the stockpile.
    What with the AZ sun and 10% humidity, I want to make a dryer with it and a black-anodized, aluminum base with a big scratch I have, but I couldn't get past the "I don't want to spend a week cutting a roast beast thin." idea.
    Thanks Paco for the idea.

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  2. V: We were going to buy an eye-of-round roast and cut it up, but the store didn't have any that day - which turned out to be a good thing, because you have to put the roast in a freezer for a couple of hours before it's firm enough to make thin cuts. The thin eye-of-round steaks are the perfect thickness.

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  3. Looks good, Paco. Do you ship.... I like regular beef jerky, but very much enjoy teriyaki beef jerky.

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