The Scouts are coming over next week to learn how to make beef jerky for their camping and hiking trips next summer. Anyone who has made the stuff knows that it isn’t a one step, one hour affair, so I’ve been preparing by making some ahead of time so that they’ll get to go home with the finished jerky.

A friend donated some old elk that had been sitting in his freezer for a while. Like giving grand kids good expensive ice cream, the Scouts aren’t going to care if their jerky is a little freezer burned or old, they’ll like anything that smells remotely like the stuff.

Actually I created kind of a reputation for my smoked jerky and myself. I showed up at a girls’ camp a few years ago with my jerky. I’ve been making it for almost 40 years and have developed some skills along the way. When their brothers found out about the treat at girl’s camp, they wanted some too. Ever since they’ve been calling me jerky man. Elk isn’t the only thing I smoke. I’ve found that smoking is an excellent way to get rid of last year’s trout. It doesn’t last long when I constantly have a bag in my brief case to share with who ever happens to be around.

So when the scouts come over on Wednesday, they’ll learn the fine art of cutting away the fat, so all that you end up with are nice long strips of good meat. The first step in making good jerky.

Marinating comes next. My marinade recipe changes from what I have on hand. It always has a soy sauce base. With onion and garlic salt, and paprika from my Hungarian forefathers. A good trick I learned is to freeze the marinade between batches of meat. I never mix meat and fish. The tastes just don’t mingle. I don’t throw it away until I’ve used it a few times, and it lowers the overall cost.

Then I lay the marinated strips on the drying racks overnight. Letting them get a good glaze from the overnight set, makes for a softer, chewier jerky.

After they’ve set at least 8 hours or so, they go into my smoker. My wife does a lot of dehydrating, and has the best there is, but the smoker adds that extra flavor you just can’t get from drying them out. I use an electric smoker, plugged into a power switch in my garage. The smell is really too strong for the house. In the summer time, when it sits out on the deck, all the neighbors are probably wondering who is barbequing at 2:00 AM. Depending on when I start the jerky, is when it gets to smoking. That’s why sometimes it’s going at that time.

Jerky, whether beef, elk or trout is a great survival food. You don’t have to have a smoker, or a dehydrator, or even an oven. An old car, sitting in the sun, makes a great place to dry food, as the inside temperature stays hot and it keeps the bugs and flies off. Pulling all the moisture out of meat makes it last without a refrigerator. When you make it yourself, you are controlling the salt and sugar in the final product, and it doesn’t have any of those nasty artificial preservatives in it. The actual drying and salting process through the marinade are the preservatives. Making your own jerky is a good and easy project that will help  you be more prepared for whatever might happen in the future.

Here’s a good marinade recipe:
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup salt
2 cups soy sauce
1 cup water
1 cup red wine (we used grape juice)
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp Tabasco sauce
Place fat trimmed and sliced meat in cool brine for 8 hours or overnight. Remove meat and allow to air dry 4-6 hours. Then place in smoker 12-16 hours.

My smoker is a Little Chief. I’ve had it forever and it still works great. Here’s a link for one just like mine, plus the chips you put in the bottom for the campground flavor. 

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