This Bayou Cajun Beef Jerky has a little spice and the zest of New Orleans. If you’re looking for a great flavor that will please all, this is your jerky! I lived in New Orleans for a while several years back and loved all the flavors found in the cooking. This recipe is inspired by the people and cooking found in the Bayou of Louisiana.
This jerky recipe has some great base flavors of salt, onion, garlic, and red pepper. I spiced it up with a little Zatarain’s hot sauce (My Favorite) and this recipe turned out perfect! I used Beef Top Round which was thinly sliced at my grocery store when making this jerky. If your butcher or meat department doesn’t have thinly sliced meat, you can ask them and most of the time they will help you out.
I decided to use my new Chef’s Elite Vacuum Marinator to speed up the marinating process. Normally my jerky marinates in the fridge for 8-24 hours, but a quick 30 minutes with this machine turned out a great flavor. It recommends to marinate for 15 minutes, but I doubled the time to make sure the jerky had a good flavor. Easy cleanup and little hassle makes using this nice too. If you are short for time and don’t want to marinate your jerky over night, I would recommend this marinator to speed things up!
After marinating, I dried in my Nesco Dehydrator for 3 1/2 hrs at 160F. Since the meat was sliced very thin, it dried very quickly to a perfect finish.
This recipe first has the Flavor of an original jerky but then finishes with a kick from the hot sauce. If you are looking for a really spicy jerky, I would recommend adding another TBSP of hot sauce and a little more ground red pepper. Enjoy!
For more in depth directions on how to dry your beef jerky, visit my page Jerky Making Methods or click on the pictures below.
- 1lb Thinly Sliced Beef Top Round
- ½ tsp sea salt
- ½ tsp smoked paprika powder
- ½ tsp garlic powder
- ½ tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp ground red pepper
- 3 tbsp Zatarain's hot sauce
- ¼ cup cold water
- Combine marinade ingredients in a bowl or ziplock bag and mix well.
- Slice ¼" strips of beef against the grain for an easy chew. Cut with the grain for a more chewy jerky. (I bought already sliced jerky for this recipe, so this step can be skipped)
- Add sliced beef to the mixture in a ziplock bag or bowl and marinate for 8-24 hours in the refrigerator. (If using a vacuum marinator, marinate for 30 minutes)
- After the meat has finished marinating, remove from refrigerator and strain excess marinade in a colander and pat dry with paper towels.
- Dry with yourfavorite jerky making method. I used my Nesco Dehydrator and dried for 3.5 hours at 160F.
- The jerky is finished when it bends and cracks, but does not break in half.
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Will, do you think that 30 min. is long enough for the curing powder to do it’s thing?
Yep. The Prague Powder #1 (nitrites) is an instant cure. Meaning that it does NOT need to marinate and when the meat heats up it starts working. Prague Powder #2 (nitrates) is what is used when making sausage and requires more time to work (the nitrates take time to break down into nitrites curing the meat).
My blood pressure was through the roof two weeks ago so now I’m on a strict diet – I’m not giving up meet. Have you done any thing with low salt?
Sure. You can keep out the salt on any recipe. If you don’t use any curing salt, just make small batches and eat within a few days. I have found that spicy recipes are good with minimal salt.