Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 303 kcal | 86 kcal |
| Protein | 54.5 g | 15.5 g |
| Fat | 2.1 g | 0.6 g |
| saturated | 0.5 g | 0.2 g |
| Carbohydrate | 13.9 g | 3.9 g |
| sugars | 11.6 g | 3.3 g |
| Fibre | 1.1 g | 0.3 g |
| Sodium | 2570 mg | 729 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
- 2.6 kg skinless, boneless turkey
- 2 1/4 cups soy sauce
- 8 3/4 tablespoons brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons chopped garlic
- 2 tablespoons (30 ml) red chilli flakes
Instructions
- Turkey breast is leaner than beef and has no marbling to hide behind, so cut the silverskin off along with any visible fat. Silverskin never softens, and a strip with a band of it running through will not tear.
- Firm the meat in the freezer until a knife meets resistance instead of sliding through. Raw poultry is soft and slippery, and warm turkey shreds under the blade rather than slicing.
- Cut strips at 6 mm, going across the muscle. Turkey breast fibres run long and unbroken, and a strip cut along them ends up closer to rope than to jerky.
- Stir the soy, brown sugar, garlic and chilli flakes together until the sugar has gone into solution, then turn the strips through it. Undissolved crystals scorch exactly where they sit.
- Cover the bowl and refrigerate it overnight on the bottom shelf. Raw poultry drips, and whatever it drips onto is not going to be cooked later.
- Wipe each strip as it goes onto the tray, then wash your hands and the board before you touch the machine. Poultry carries more surface bacteria than beef does, and a dehydrator is warm enough to suit them before it is hot enough to kill them.
- Dry at 68 °C for 9 hours and leave the door shut for the first hour. That hour is when the meat passes through the temperature band where bacteria multiply fastest, and it should pass through it quickly.
- It is ready when a cooled strip bends to a right angle, cracks, and shows dry white fibre at the break with no pink or translucent core. Poultry gets no benefit of the doubt: if you are unsure, give it longer.
- Cool it completely, then seal it — a week in the cupboard, a month in the fridge, six in the freezer. Turkey has less fat than beef but this recipe also carries less salt, so it does not sit as comfortably on a shelf.
