Making your own jerky can provide you with snacks for up to a year if you store the finished product correctly. Making jerky yourself allows you to modify the jerky's flavor and texture in a way that suits your tastes. You can decide, for example, whether you want to make the jerky stringy and chewy or tender and crumbly. Tailor the jerky's flavor by soaking it in a marinade with your choice of ingredients before drying it.
Instructions
1. Trim the piece of meat you wish to make into jerky to remove any bones, gristle, fat or connective tissue. The meat should be completely raw at this point; there is no need to cook it before dehydrating it.
2. Put the trimmed piece of meat into your freezer. Allow it to freeze until it is firm, but not frozen solid. The length of time this will take will vary greatly based on the size of the piece of meat you wish to freeze, so check on the meat regularly. The goal is simply to make the meat firmer, which will allow you to cut it more evenly and with more control.
3. Slice the meat into thin strips of approximately the same thickness. Choose a width between 1/8 inch and 1/4 inch and cut all the strips as close as possible to this thickness.
4. Soak the meat slices in a marinade of your choice for at least an hour but up to overnight. Use enough marinade to completely cover the meat, and keep the meat in the refrigerator while you marinate it. Stir the meat and marinade several times during this process to ensure the meat marinates evenly.
5. Lay the strips of meat on clean kitchen towels to drain off the extra marinade. Arrange the drained strips of meat on racks (if you are dehydrating them in the oven) or dehydrator trays (if you are using a dehydrator).
6. Dry the meat at 140 degrees Fahrenheit, until it cracks when you bend it. It should not break or seem brittle, however. Remove the dried meat from the dehydrator or oven and store it in an airtight container. You can keep your jerky in the refrigerator for several weeks; to store it longer than that, put it in the freezer for up to a year.
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