Homemade Beef Jerky = Success!

I decided to just dive in and do something awesome with my new dehydrator.  So I made Beef Jerky!

I'm actually very pleased with my $20 Dehydrator.  The dehydrating times are a lot better than I thought, I figured since I didn't buy a "nicer" (more expensive) dehydrator with a fan the times would be a lot longer but they are actually comparable to other top models, in my opinion.  The beef jerky was done in less than 11 hours.  Just be sure to "rotate" the trays so everything gets dehydrated evenly, especially if you have more than 2-3 trays going at one time.  By "rotate" I mean take the tray on top and move it to the bottom, and do this every few hours.

I made some last week and it got gone in 2 days!  So I had to make some more this week, this time I bought a bigger piece of meat so it'll last me longer.  

I didn't really follow a recipe, although I looked through many online.  A lot of people like to use flank steak or round steak.  I used Round Roast, but from what I've read just about any cut of beef will work, just make sure there is as little fat as possible in the meat.  From what I gather you pretty much put what sounds good to you in the marinade.  Here's what I used:

Soy Sauce (this was the main ingredient for my marinade)
Worcestershire Sauce
Salt
Pepper
Garlic Powder
Crushed Red Pepper Flakes (to make it spicy)


Trim as much fat ass possible off the meat.  Cut your meat into 1/8 to 1/4 inch slices.

Marinade as long as you want.  Some people say to marinate overnight, others say 6-8 hours.  On my first batch I marinated it for 30 minutes, and it tasted great.  The second batch I marinated it for 2 hours, and didn't notice a difference flavor wise, the main difference I is the second batch was spicier because it had more time with the crushed red pepper.

Depending on how thick your jerky is, as well as how dry you like it, will depend on how long it needs to dehydrate.
I did the first batch for 11 hours.  The second batch I accidentally went to long, about 13 hours, so it was dehydrated too much.  It's still edible it is a lot easier to tear and will be chewy once your start chewing it.

But if you find you've dehydrated it more than you like I found a trick online that I tried and it works!:
Take a piece of bread and put it in the center of a zip-lock bag with the beef jerky around it and leave it overnight or until the jerky is how you like.  The jerky will absorb the moisture from the bread.  The bread will be dry like toast when you take it out.

$20 Food Dehydrator - Part 2

Well it worked!  It actually didn't take as long as I thought it would.  Then again, I guess it all depends on how many trays you are doing, and how thick you cut your fruit/veggies.  It took less than 11 hours for the apple slices, just a bit longer for the orange slices.

So over all I'm pleased with it.  Not bad for $20!  Now the test will be will it hold up and continue working for years to come?  It does come with a 2 year warranty (of course I have to send in the warranty card first :-P ) but hopefully everything will continue working just fine.  Now let's see what else can I dehydrate?!

$20 Food Dehydrator

Today I bought a cheap food dehydrator for $20.  Yep $20.  But like I said it's cheap, nothing fancy, not top of line, name brand or anything.  I bought it at ALDI's  They've had them in the past but wasn't sure if it would be any good.  They came back again this season and I thought I might as well give it a try instead of waiting until I find $300 laying around that I don't need for something else :-P

Every time I have seen them at ALDI they have sold out pretty quick.  I know one of my area stores has already sold out and another only had 4 left, as opposed to a week ago they had around 15.  It comes with 5 trays, the base, the lid, and instruction manual/recipe book.

I currently have some apple and orange slices in it.  From what I can tell it does not have a fan, so dehydration times will probably be a lot longer than those high priced models.  I may go ahead and add some pineapple as well.

I'll post an update within a day or so (whenever it finishes) and let y'all know how it works!

*****UPDATE 8:08 PM*****

Out of curiosity I put a thermometer through the top and with three trays it is reading 140° F.