Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 655 kcal | 186 kcal |
| Protein | 44.4 g | 12.6 g |
| Fat | 51.6 g | 14.6 g |
| saturated | 19.9 g | 5.6 g |
| Carbohydrate | 0 g | 0 g |
| sugars | 0 g | 0 g |
| Fibre | 0 g | 0 g |
| Sodium | 173 mg | 49 mg |
Estimated from the ingredients, for the finished dried product. Actual values vary with the produce you use and how far you dry it.
Ingredients
- 2.4 kg minced beef (lean or extra lean)
- Finely ground bread crumbs
Instructions
- Start with the leanest mince you can find. Fat is the only thing that stops this working — it will not dry, it coats every grain, and it is what makes stored mince go rancid rather than keep.
- Brown the mince in a dry pan, breaking it up constantly so no lump survives. Lumps are the whole problem: the outside of one dries while the middle stays raw.
- Stir the breadcrumbs through while the meat is still hot. They soak up the fat that has rendered out and keep the grains separate, which is why they are in the recipe at all.
- Tip the lot into a colander lined with paper and rinse it under hot running water, then let it drain well. It sounds wrong and it is the step that matters most — it takes out the fat that would otherwise limit the batch to a couple of months.
- Spread the drained crumbs one layer deep on a lined tray and level them off with a fork. Piled up, the grains underneath steam rather than dry.
- Dry at 71 °C for 7 hours, stirring the grains around with a fork every couple of hours. That temperature is not a suggestion on cooked meat — it is the line this catalogue holds for drying it safely — and each stir brings the damp grains up from the bottom into the moving air, which is the difference between an even batch and a patchy one.
- The mince is finished when each grain is hard and rattles on the tray, like small gravel, with nothing soft left when you crush a handful. Let a spoonful cool before you decide, and if anything squashes between your fingers the whole tray goes back on.
- Vacuum-seal the cooled grains and keep them in a cool dark cupboard, where a properly de-fatted batch holds a year or more. Without a vacuum seal call it three months, and let them soak in boiling water for a quarter of an hour before they go into a sauce.
