First legitimate attempt at jerky

sdbelt

Ok, I'm trying jerky for the first time since this summer. It was only 75 outside when I started, and today should reach a high of "only" 85. Still not prime jerky weather, but my wife brought some store bought stuff home yesterday, and the itch was incurable.[p]So far, 90 minutes into the dry, things are progressing very, very nicely. The high dome temp has been 160, and the low dome temp was 120 (right at the start).[p]I marinated a 2.5 lb London Broil, that I sliced fairly thin, overnight. It's a standard mix of worchestersire, soy, pepper, onion powder, and garlic powder. It should not be very spicey.[p]I decided to try a new (for me) indirect method. I flipped my place setter upside down and put a drip pan in it. Seems to be working fairly well so far. My lower vent is just barely open. The meat is so moist, that it's going to take a while to dry it out. [p]I flipped it all after about 60 minutes. The pieces on the edge were clearly drier than those in the center. I rotated the worst of these into the middle, and will keep this process of flip and move inward going each hour.[p]The only trouble I can foresee is that when I open the dome, the fire spikes up significantly. I think it calms down after a few minutes, but it's still concerning.[p]I'll post back later with any results (good or bad),[p]--sdb

Mop

sdbelt, you best be carefull with a dome temp of 120 without cure in your mix, I`m not sure if you used cure, you didn`t mention...remember the 40ºto140º food safety range..[p]enjoy the jerk![p]Mop

sdbelt

Mop,[p]That only lasted for about 15 minutes...as the egg was coming up to temp, and the meat was very cold, upon initial placement. The only way I could maintain a dome temp of 120, is to put the fire out...the sun alone around here will yield dome temps of 130 or more![p]--sdb

sdbelt

Looks like I tried for jerky while it was still too hot. Dome temp has now reached 220, as the egg just went into the sun for the afternoon. I've had the bottom vent completely closed for over 30 minutes, as I watched that dome temp go from 200 to 220. During that time, there was no vent on the top...so I'm stopping it down even more...just put the daisy wheel on there, with the slide closed but the daisy vents fully open. We'll see if I can finally arrest the rising dome temps.[p]The good news is that the jerky itself is still looking good. The few pieces that had to be covered are now exposed and a nice red to dark red color is forming on everything, as I flipped and rotated.[p]--sdb

Gfw

<p />sdbelt, welcome to the jerky club - sounds like you are well on your way - something that I have found very helpful as a way of controling temperature ar firebricks.

[ul][li]Gfw's BBQ - FireBricks and Jerky[/ul]

sdbelt

Ok, here's how it went. I now have "jerky". A bit of it was on there too long, and as feared, the egg was too hot for the majority of the dry/cook. I ended up going with the completely closed bottom vent and the daisy wheel on top, from after my first post until the end. These settings resulted in about a 220 dome temp for the last 2-3 hours, which is definitely too hot.[p]I think I could probably maintain 200 or lower like this, if the egg weren't in direct sunlight, so I'll definitely be giving it a go again.[p]To be sure, this was my best batch ever. It still wasn't "jerky", but it's getting close, and the result has at least been edible.[p]--sdb

sdbelt

Gfw,[p]I've got firebricks as well, but I wanted to give the upside down place setter a try. If my fire had gone out (in hindsight, this wasn't a problem), I wanted quick and easy access to the lump. And, I had recently seen another post with that method being used on something, and it looked smart.[p]Anyway, thanks for the tip. I've looked your site over many times, and jerky is going to be finding a successful home here if it kills me![p]--sdb