This recipe is an easy recipe to follow and turns out a pretty good tasting jerky. Including sweet BBQ sauce and hot sauce, this should have been a sweet and spicy jerky. I did not taste much of the heat, but really tasted the sweet.
I found a recipe online that I changed to suit what I had in the cabinet. I have been wondering the last couple days if the ingredients I left out would have made this jerky a 5 star instead of a 3 star. I might have to return to this recipe and make it according to the website I got it off.
I decided to smoke this jerky while I was smoking Alton Brown’s recipe. Mesquite wood chips were used and a couple of beers were drank while I sat back and let the smoker do it’s job.
As I mentioned earlier, I think I am going to return to this recipe and try it again with all the ingredients. Everyone enjoyed it as listed below, there just wasn’t enough heat for me to fully enjoy it.
Easy Beef Jerky
Ingredients
Lean Beef:
- 1 lb eye of round
Marinade:
- 2/3 cup soy sauce
- 1/4 cup molasses
- 2 tbsp ginger
- 2 tbsp bbq sauce sweet tomato based
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 tsp hot sauce
- 1 cup mesquite wood chips only if using a smoker
Optional
- 1/4 tsp Curing Salt Prague Powder #1
Instructions
- Pick a lean cut of beef and trim off all visible fat. After trimming the fat, place the beef in the freezer for an hour or two to partially freeze.
- Mix soy sauce, molasses, ginger, bbq sauce, salt, and hot sauce in a container with a tight fitting lid.
- Remove beef from the freezer and slice against the grain between 1/8"-1/4" thick.
- Add the sliced beef to the marinade and stir well to evenly coat. Set in the refrigerator and allow to marinade for 6-24 hours.
- When finished marinating, remove meat from the refrigerator and pat dry with paper towels.
- Place strips of jerky on metal rack to be placed inside your favorite smoker. Add racks to a smoker that has been heated to 145 degrees F.
- Add 1 cup of mesquite wood chips to the wood tray. Smoke jerky for a total of 3 hours, then raise heat to 165 degrees for an additional hour. Check jerky and dry longer until jerky is finished.
- Jerky will be finished when it bends and cracks, but does not break in half. Allow to cool for several hours before storing in an air tight container.
Visit Jerky Making Method for more in depth information on all types of drying methods.