Easy Jerky

I'd looked in the past at how to do jerky, but hadn't wanted to buy a dehydrator, and never had an oven around that could go low enough to not cook the meat.

Well, Quintus Curtius pointed me in a new direction, whereupon I felt mildly dumbfounded that I hadn't thought of it or seen it before.

Basically - all you need is airflow. And salt. Oh, and to keep it away from pets not only to not having it get eaten, but if your dog sheds (huskies, retrievers, etc...).

Here's a few links:

This is the closest I've found to what Quintus was talking about - certainly closer than the "box fan" method:

The box fan method per Alton Brown is explained here: but I don't like it for two reasons - I don't like picking paper/filter material out of my meat, and given what filters cost these days, it's not much of a cost savings. It does tend to deal with pet hair / environmental debris issues though.

More information on meat drying is here: http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/ai407e/AI407E18.htm

So why is it safe?

Salt is a preservative. As long as the meat dries fast enough, moisture isn't trapped in the meat, and there's nowhere for bacteria to grow. And you don't need heat - moving air is more than enough. You'll note dehydrators you can buy, which are cheaper than they used to be but still take up a lot of kitchen storage space compared to a couple cookie cooling racks, all have fans. And I've already got fans that can be repurposed for a few hours at a time.

Incidentally, I found Salt: A History to be an interesting book, though I don't recall any jerky recipes.

So racks that expose all sides of the meat to moving air, and keeping it away from critters and people that will eat it or get stuff on it. And getting enough salt in it to preserve it.

I've only tried once so far in a small batch. The thinner pieces were completely dry. I wasn't in a position to leave it out overnight so I decided to try what I had anyway despite the thicker pieces not being dried through after 4+ hours. it was delicious, I'm still feeling great, and next time I'll make sure I have the time or means to leave it out longer. It certainly, even in the thinner, drier pieces, was far more tender than most store jerky.

Cast Iron

I can second every word of this article on cast-iron cookware, including this excerpt:

Since cast iron is made from the same stuff Hephaestus used in his forges for side projects like his automata delivery service to Olympus, you can use it just about anywhere. Stove top, in the oven, out over an open fire camping, cast iron don’t care. It’s the honeybadger of cookware.

 Bought a large - 10" or so - skillet to cook on, and while it gets less use than it otherwise might due to weight, glass cooktops, and elderly family members still trying to help in the kitchen, every word in that article matches my experience.

Yes, it took a few tries to season - with one time me deciding to scour it down with steel wool because of how badly stuff got stuck on it. That said, it only took a few tries, and once I got the "knack" the two other times I retreated it "just because" went very smoothly. Now, I can fry an egg in it with nothing sticking as long as a little butter or bacon grease sits in the bottom of the pan, it takes far more heat for searing steaks than a teflon pan, it can be put in the oven to finish a "bake" dish, and if I can't simply scrub it off with a stiff-haired brush, some kosher or rock salt handily scrapes off whatever baked on. Lightly oil it back up and stow it.

One further advantage of "takes more heat" is "can't mess it up by overheating it like teflon"

Going forward I intend to replace all my teflon with either cast iron, or in the cases of stock/soup pots, stainless.