The Cantina

I love beef jerky but it’s so expensive to buy, so I used my black belt in Google Fu to research how to make beef jerky. I came across many recipes and I combined a few and came up with a pretty good one. Here’s what I do.

The store where I shop sells thinly sliced top round steak. It usually comes with 2 slices in a pack, about 12 inches long, 5 inches wide and 1/4 of an inch thick. It usually weighs in between a pound or a pound and a half. I take that and cut it down into about 1 inch wide strips and if they are real long I cut them down to maybe 6 inches in length. Once the meat is cut it’s time to make the marinade. In a big ziplock bag add

1/4 cup liquid smoke (Hickory)
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
1-1/2 teaspoons sea salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
15 drops of Tabasco sauce

mix it up real good and put the meat in the bag and squish and mix it all around. Let it sit in the fridge for at least 12 hours. I let the last batch marinate for 24. It’s up to you, but I’d go at least 12.

When your ready to finish it, take it out and put it into a colander to drain it. Put a sheet or two of tin foil on the bottom of your oven and put the oven rack in the top position as high as you can get it. Then take a tooth pick and poke one through the end of one of the beef strips and put it up through the bottom of the rack and turn it sideways so that it hangs. Hang them all like that.

Turn the oven to 180 degrees and let it go for anywhere between 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 hours depending on the thickness of the meat and how you like it. Remember, it’s not about cooking the meat so much as it is drying it out.

That’s it. Let it cool, remove the tooth picks and enjoy!

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