Beef jerky

aints25

Hey Eggers,my wife wants me make jerky in the oven, but I told I could do it on the egg. So now I need some ideas, can you help? Starting with meats, thickness, temps and so forth. I am a rookie at this but would to like to try it. Sounds like a great project.

jeffc5227

Bottom round is the meat I use slice to desired thickness.

JohnInCarolina

My recommendation is to invest in a dehydrator, as the BGE really isn't ideal for maintaining the kind of sustained low temperatures you want for drying out beef jerky.  Then if you want some smoke you can get it started on the BGE and transfer it once you think it's received enough.

etherdome

I second  the motion for a dehydrator . I would choose oven over egg any day.  I one an excaliber dehydrator that works great. 

buzd504

JohnInCarolina said:

My recommendation is to invest in a dehydrator, as the BGE really isn't ideal for maintaining the kind of sustained low temperatures you want for drying out beef jerky.  Then if you want some smoke you can get it started on the BGE and transfer it once you think it's received enough.

Yep, this.  And I would even consider an Amaz'n smoker on the egg as a regular fire will get hotter than you want it.

Cornholio

While a dehydrator would be best I’ve made some pretty good jerky by starting it on the egg then finishing it in the oven with the door cracked open. I use the kick ash basket lump divider and only use a little bit of lump to keep the fire in check (large BGE). To be honest I’ve always just kind of winged it so I don’t have a guide for times, just keep the temp as low as possible for the egg then ~160 oven temp. 

I put the meat in the freezer to get it semi frozen for easier slicing (thin slices). Remove as much fat as possible. Eye of the round or bottom as mentioned. Tons of marinade recipes online. 

Have fun experimenting.

 

the_crease

Agreed on dehydrator.  I like to use eye of round cut with the grain (freeze it for a bit to get thin slices, about 1/8 inch) at the highest setting, I think around 160 degrees or so for approx 4-5 hrs.  Mix meat with Prague powder #1.  1 level teaspoon for 5lb of meat.  After that I just season with salt and pepper.  I know a lot of people like teriyaki and soy/Worcester based marinades but the Prague powder, salt and pepper, really bring out the beefiness ( is this a word?!?) of the jerky.  Good luck  

Gulfcoastguy

In my thread below, the recipe says to dehydrate it at 160F. Maybe you could do it in an offset smoker but an Egg would be 200 to 225.

HendersonTRKing

I've made a bunch -- it's easy and delicious.  It can be done on the egg, but like @Cornholio, I've switched to an egg-oven combo. I get smoke from the egg and finish on the dehydrate setting in a relatively new Wolf oven.  Didn't even know I had that setting til I googled around a bunch and found out.  The oven has been a pita -- 3 warranty services in 2 years -- but that's another story.  When the unit is online, the dehydration setting works like a charm!

https://eggheadforum.com/discussion/1218859/ot-beef-jerky-time-ot#latest

Jeffroe189

I did jerky on the egg one time a while back and It came out so smokey. It really was not good. 

I have a coworker that did deer jerky on a electric cabinet smoker and it turned out really good. 

aints25

Thank you all for the information, I will have to check the dehydrator option, and review the bge/oven process. Sounds like lm going to get lots of practice.

nolaegghead

Pro tip if you want to store your jerky for more than a couple weeks or so.  Add some potassium sorbate to it.  There are instructions on the web.  Doesn't impact flavor.  Doesn't make it less healthy.  What it does do is inhibit mold from growing on it.

lkapigian

All above is good....set your oven to the lowest setting, pit a foil ball in the door to keep it propped open and humidity down...id smoke post dehydrate 

Canugghead

Used to make jerky in egg only, then egg-dehydrator combo, finally settled on Traeger which is way easier.

Cornholio

nolaegghead said:

Pro tip if you want to store your jerky for more than a couple weeks or so.  Add some potassium sorbate to it.  There are instructions on the web.  Doesn't impact flavor.  Doesn't make it less healthy.  What it does do is inhibit mold from growing on it.

Good to know, thanks! 

I used to make pretty small batches of jerky and actually haven’t made any since getting a CGS AR. Now that I have more real estate to make more jerky I might have to look into getting some CH3CH=CH−CH=CH−CO2K.