17lb batch of smoked beef jerky

[Jamieson22]

I have a few co-workers that subtlety bring up the topic of my smoked beef jerky fairly often. One of them is not so subtle and will be in town (Chicago) from NY this week. So when I was last at Costco I grabbed a few packs of eye of round. This is one time I don’t mind the “mechanically tenderized” beef from Costco as I figure it helps slices absorb more seasoning.

Sliced it all up on Monday eve and and split into 4 x 4-1/3lb piles. I used PS Seasoning Sweet & Hot on 3 of them and PS Maple Jalapeno on 1 of them (each seasoning pack covers 5lbs so wanted to try a bit stronger flavor). More for my own recall I had my slicer dial set to 10 for 1/4" but seemed a tad thicker than normal.

This morning (Wednesday) I laid the Sweet & Hot out on my 6 PK100 racks and as you can see by last one it just barely fit. I patted it all dry with paper towel to help speed the drying along.

Currently running in my PK100 at 150F with vents 90% closed for 1 hour. Then will bump up to 160F and add some Cherry smoke and open vents up.

On my last jerky thread I mentioned that I rarely pick up the “sweet” in a recipe over the smoke. twilliams mentioned he often uses his PK (big brother to mine) for jerky without any smoke with great results. Based on that, I plan to tone way down on the sawdust compared to normal. Hoping for more a “hint” of smoke this time.

The Maple Jalapeno batch all fit on the top rack of my Pitts & Spitts Maverick 1250. They recently posted the controller commands to set the smoker low-point to 140F vs previous 160F. So currently running it at 140F and will for a couple couple hours. The convection of a pellet smoker seems to cook MUCH faster than my PK100 so will just bump it up a bit as need till I hit 170F or so.

[RON PARRISH]

Jamieson22 Looking good!

[lkrfletcher]

Jamieson22 - Nice

[bocephus]

Jamieson22 Your friends are lucky you are a nice guy. All are looking good.

[processhead]

Can you elaborate on how you are applying the seasoning and how long you hold it prior to smoking? Looks like you have some fine jerky coming along there.

My method looks somewhat similar. Slice, layout on trays, sprinkle seasoning, then I stack up the slices in a pan and refrigerate overnight to cure before smoking the next day.

[Deepwoodsbutcher]

That jerky is looking great!

[calldoctoday]

Jamieson22 Coming along very nice!

[Dave in AZ]

Jamieson22 looks great, and those are some top notch cooking devices you have. I liked seeing the pics of how they held the jerky too, thx!

[Jamieson22]

processhead So for each 5lb of meat I mix the seasoning and cure in 1 cup of water in a big bowl. Then I add a few slices at a time and swirl around to coat evenly then drop into a gallon freezer bag. Once done I pour remaining liquid into ziploc and seal. Then I lay flat in fridge for 1-2 nights and turn/knead a few times.

[gus4416]

Jamieson22 tha5 looks great hope it turns out good

[kyle]

Jamieson22 looks very good. Nice setup you got

[Jamieson22]

The P&S batch is almost there. Giving it 30 min longer before I check and start pulling some pieces.

PK100 is a ways behind. A few pieces have been pulled already but majority are still quite floppy after rotating shelves/pieces twice.

[bocephus]

Jamieson22 That is really looking good.

[DJS303]

Looks great. I really like the color of the jerky. Mine always seems to come out much darker when using beef.

[calldoctoday]

Jamieson22 Looking Gooood! I like smoking mine a good few hours first at about 165° & then moving to the dehydrator for finishing. That gets some good smoke flavor into the meat before the final onslaught. Yours look fantastic though.

[Jamieson22]

All pulled and chilling a bit before bagging. Came in just around 8 hours for final pieces to be done. I think the P&S does a better job with it than the PK100 - especially now that it can go down to 140F vs 180F previous. Certainly less pieces with the white salty sort of dry coating.

P&S Left, PK100 Right

P&S:

PK100:

[Jamieson22]

One more…

[glen]

Jamieson22 I like the color

[bocephus]

Jamieson22 Good looking jerky, I like the jerky like that.

[Jamieson22]

calldoctoday I was tempted to do some in my Excalibur dehydrator today as well but didn’t want one more thing to clean.