Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 367 kcal | 104 kcal |
| Protein | 45.6 g | 12.9 g |
| Fat | 11.9 g | 3.4 g |
| saturated | 4.2 g | 1.2 g |
| Carbohydrate | 16.6 g | 4.7 g |
| sugars | 10.4 g | 2.9 g |
| Fibre | 1.4 g | 0.4 g |
| Sodium | 2043 mg | 579 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
- 1.8 kg flank steak
- 2 3/4 cups ginger ale
- 5 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 2 3/4 tablespoons (41 ml) salt
- 1 3/4 tablespoons dry mustard (like Colman's)
- 2 3/4 teaspoons cayenne pepper
- 2 3/4 teaspoons liquid smoke
Instructions
- Trim the flank steak of all fat and chill the pieces before grinding. Warm meat smears in a grinder and the fat separates out as a paste that will never dry.
- Grind it to the texture of mince and mix the ginger ale, brown sugar, salt, mustard powder, cayenne and liquid smoke through it thoroughly with your hands. Ground meat has no grain to hide an uneven mix, so any patch you miss will taste of nothing.
- Work the mixture for a minute longer than feels necessary until it starts to feel tacky. That stickiness is the protein binding, and it is the only thing holding a formed strip together.
- Load the jerky gun or a piping bag with a 6 mm to 12 mm tip, and rest the mixture in the fridge if it has warmed up in your hands. Soft mixture spreads sideways the moment it leaves the nozzle.
- Pipe lines onto the drying sheets about 13 mm wide and 20.3 cm long, then press each one lightly flat with your fingers. A round strip dries to a hard shell with a raw core, which on ground meat is a real problem rather than a texture one.
- Dehydrate at 71 °C for 7 hours, and blot the strips with paper partway through if fat has beaded on the surface. Ground meat renders more than sliced meat does.
- A finished stick bends without snapping and tears apart in a dry, crumbly break rather than a stringy one. Ground jerky never goes leathery the way sliced jerky does, so it is the break you judge and not the bend.
- Cool the sticks on a rack, then keep them in a sealed jar in the fridge for two weeks or frozen for three months. Ground meat has far more surface area than a sliced strip, which is exactly why this one does not belong in a pantry.
