Jerky Time!

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Apr 8, 2019
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Just pulled these out of the smoker...I set it to 200 with hickory and apple wood. After 2hrs I check them, they are pulled when internal temp is 165. Check with meat probe.
These will cool for a couple hours in the fridge...then I will seperate, vac pac/freeze. Should be cooled enough by kickoff tonight.20241104_151624.jpg
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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Just pulled these out of the smoker...I set it to 200 with hickory and apple wood. After 2hrs I check them, they are pulled when internal temp is 165. Check with meat probe.
These will cool for a couple hours in the fridge...then I will seperate, vac pac/freeze. Should be cooled enough by kickoff tonight.View attachment 786300
party time!

which smoker you running?
 
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it really doesn't take much if smoke and heat are the only goals.

I'm jonesing on my BIL's Traeger but still getting it done with the little chief
Had one and got rid of it...we do too much seafood on the grill...traeger doesn't get hot enough to grill fish...its 1.5 to the coast for me, so we always have fresh fish.
I like the little box smoker..it works well. I went to a dehydrator for jerky..I can get way more jerky in my 9 tray Excalibur than I can the smoker.
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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materbuilt electric black friday special...lol

8lbs ground venison with 10% fat, 1lb pork belly, 1lb high temp cheddar
View attachment 786494

OK, I’m back at it today. I didn’t have time to go track down any of that high temp cheese, but I did buy the LEM casings and I’m running their snack stick recipe today.

ad4422847de017630f72093259199c17.jpg


It recommends 20% pork or pork fat so I put in 3 ounces of bacon to 24 ozs of ground elk burger, not quite 20% but my butcher had added 5% or 10% beef fat to this grind.

It took a little while to get the hang of filling the casings from the jerky cannon. I finally realized you can’t fill an entire casing from one end, (creates too much pressure and splits the casing) but you need to slide the casing over the jerky cannon and then fill it slowly as you pull the casing off of the cannon. It does help to have the meat at room temperature vs. cold

ce8d2728c1b2a93d5f581c594e5e7815.jpg

cf7a00c6779c14905e66dd2e8907f56c.jpg


Also, I bought the 19 mm casing, which is what my system recommends, it was still really hard to get it over the end of the jerkycannon. So if you do this, you gotta find a way to open up the end of the casing. Turns out my meat thermometer case has a taper on it, and that worked perfectly.

eeba7f0248faefae8de776af753bdf88.jpg



It still took a while to get the hang of it and you can see some of the first ones I did that are on the left of the picture below are pretty retarded. I did get better as I completed the job.

dd3cb2be0f5d0514facb2fa90e1a071f.jpg


I’m gonna run two or three trays of Mesquite and the recipe says that they have to finish at 180°. Pretty sure my Little Chief smoker won’t get them that hot so I’ll probably have to finish them in the oven at some point. I will report back.

7a513bc31891d3517e4808c78adbf195.jpg



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Those jerky guns work great, I have the same one I beleive. I use the dual tip to speed things up.

Snack sticks are definitely on my list of things to attempt.

I'm still eating snack sticks the butcher made out of my moose last year, which I shot Nov 2nd. If they are packed correctly and frozen they'll be fine a year later no problem.
 

satchamo

WKR
Joined
Jan 23, 2014
Messages
770
The jerky guns work but it’s a pain in the ass to load after the first time unless you unscrew both ends off to load (Also a pita). The top fills with meat so you go to load it and air cant escape so you’re pushing air down and it creates this hydraulic effect and it’s hard to fill it completely. I’ve been thinking about getting an extra long straw to create a snorkel so to speak…

But once they’re loaded they do work. I recommend the LEM jerky cannon. It’s very consistent in its thickness and has a larger tube.

Also be prepared to be disappointed, ground jerky is fine, in fact it’s great. But it comes nowhere close to sliced jerky. But it is way better in that you can use crap cuts, throw it in a grinder and go vs using large muscles like you do with sliced jerky.
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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Those jerky guns work great, I have the same one I beleive. I use the dual tip to speed things up.

Snack sticks are definitely on my list of things to attempt.

I'm still eating snack sticks the butcher made out of my moose last year, which I shot Nov 2nd. If they are packed correctly and frozen they'll be fine a year later no problem.

Hey man, this is the LEM, 1.5 pound capacity jerky cannon. I’m not sure what you mean by “dual tip”, I just have one to make flat jerky and then the other round one show to fill casings.

ca2c87fc1e39fb93bfa24637f5857fb9.jpg



I just pulled these from the oven. Two mesquite trays over 4 hours on the smoker and then I checked the internal temperature and it was 120, so I moved them into the oven and took them to 165 which is what the recipe called for. I might’ve said 180 earlier but that’s wrong.

Taste test: I’m pretty dang happy with these. Good pepperoni flavor (even though the flavoring mix doesn’t mention pepperoni, just said “snack sticks”).

They could use a tiny bit more heat, but that’s just me. The casings are a little bit chewy but ok.

I’m wondering if anyone has done a comparison between the collagen type which I believe these are and the sheep casings.?

Either way, really happy I took this on and learned how to do this. Going to have way more ways to use my burger now.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Joined
Apr 8, 2019
Messages
1,969
OK, I’m back at it today. I didn’t have time to go track down any of that high temp cheese, but I did buy the LEM casings and I’m running their snack stick recipe today.

ad4422847de017630f72093259199c17.jpg


It recommends 20% pork or pork fat so I put in 3 ounces of bacon to 24 ozs of ground elk burger, not quite 20% but my butcher had added 5% or 10% beef fat to this grind.

It took a little while to get the hang of filling the casings from the jerky cannon. I finally realized you can’t fill an entire casing from one end, (creates too much pressure and splits the casing) but you need to slide the casing over the jerky cannon and then fill it slowly as you pull the casing off of the cannon. It does help to have the meat at room temperature vs. cold

ce8d2728c1b2a93d5f581c594e5e7815.jpg

cf7a00c6779c14905e66dd2e8907f56c.jpg


Also, I bought the 19 mm casing, which is what my system recommends, it was still really hard to get it over the end of the jerkycannon. So if you do this, you gotta find a way to open up the end of the casing. Turns out my meat thermometer case has a taper on it, and that worked perfectly.

eeba7f0248faefae8de776af753bdf88.jpg



It still took a while to get the hang of it and you can see some of the first ones I did that are on the left of the picture below are pretty retarded. I did get better as I completed the job.

dd3cb2be0f5d0514facb2fa90e1a071f.jpg


I’m gonna run two or three trays of Mesquite and the recipe says that they have to finish at 180°. Pretty sure my Little Chief smoker won’t get them that hot so I’ll probably have to finish them in the oven at some point. I will report back.

7a513bc31891d3517e4808c78adbf195.jpg



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Some good tips and tricks in this vid for using the gun...twisting your casing after its filled works well...way less knots to make.

Looks great!
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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Joined
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Messages
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Location
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The jerky guns work but it’s a pain in the ass to load after the first time unless you unscrew both ends off to load (Also a pita). The top fills with meat so you go to load it and air cant escape so you’re pushing air down and it creates this hydraulic effect and it’s hard to fill it completely. I’ve been thinking about getting an extra long straw to create a snorkel so to speak…

But once they’re loaded they do work. I recommend the LEM jerky cannon. It’s very consistent in its thickness and has a larger tube.

Also be prepared to be disappointed, ground jerky is fine, in fact it’s great. But it comes nowhere close to sliced jerky. But it is way better in that you can use crap cuts, throw it in a grinder and go vs using large muscles like you do with sliced jerky.

Hey man, thanks for sharing, I must’ve got lucky because I have not experienced that hydraulic effect.

The instructions said to roll the burger into a skinny log and drop it in. I can do about 6-8 ounces at a time and I just drop them in until it’s full to within 1” of the top.

Then I just put the tip down tight on the counter so nothing can escape and give it some pressure to smash the meat together and remove air.

I have not been taking off both ends when I refill it. In fact, I made strip jerky last weekend and I put the cannon in the refrigerator without cleaning it. When I pulled it out today, I did take the tip out to make sure the burger hadn’t turned brown and it was just fine.

I made some muscle cuts last week without the gun and probably do prefer those, but the jerky burger is definitely good and easier to chew

I’m just excited to have a way to use up all this burger that I always end up with.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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Joined
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Messages
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Some good tips and tricks in this vid for using the gun...twisting your casing after its filled works well...way less knots to make.

Looks great!

Thanks for the video. I will watch that. I had forgot to ask what everybody was doing to twist these off because I’m noticing now that I pulled them from the oven, some of them have come unraveled. no meat is coming out but they just look retarded. Like the chef.


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Joined
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Messages
339
Location
AB
Hey man, this is the LEM, 1.5 pound capacity jerky cannon. I’m not sure what you mean by “dual tip”, I just have one to make flat jerky and then the other round one show to fill casings.

ca2c87fc1e39fb93bfa24637f5857fb9.jpg



I just pulled these from the oven. Two mesquite trays over 4 hours on the smoker and then I checked the internal temperature and it was 120, so I moved them into the oven and took them to 165 which is what the recipe called for. I might’ve said 180 earlier but that’s wrong.

Taste test: I’m pretty dang happy with these. Good pepperoni flavor (even though the flavoring mix doesn’t mention pepperoni, just said “snack sticks”).

They could use a tiny bit more heat, but that’s just me. The casings are a little bit chewy but ok.

I’m wondering if anyone has done a comparison between the collagen type which I believe these are and the sheep casings.?

Either way, really happy I took this on and learned how to do this. Going to have way more ways to use my burger now.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Something like this: https://www.lemproducts.com/product...tcafrt3DkyUPHA3yFmoL6F5P8h-eztXc-U456jERJcVTZ
 
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robby denning

robby denning

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Staff member
Joined
Feb 25, 2012
Messages
15,619
Location
SE Idaho
Some good tips and tricks in this vid for using the gun...twisting your casing after its filled works well...way less knots to make.

Looks great!

OK, I went and watched that video. I was loading these casings totally wrong! I was cutting the casings to the preferred length and then filling them. I didn’t realize you just slide the casing on the tip and start cranking! Now I see how you can tie a knot in them too. Thanks man!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

satchamo

WKR
Joined
Jan 23, 2014
Messages
770
Hey man, thanks for sharing, I must’ve got lucky because I have not experienced that hydraulic effect.

The instructions said to roll the burger into a skinny log and drop it in. I can do about 6-8 ounces at a time and I just drop them in until it’s full to within 1” of the top.

Then I just put the tip down tight on the counter so nothing can escape and give it some pressure to smash the meat together and remove air.

I have not been taking off both ends when I refill it. In fact, I made strip jerky last weekend and I put the cannon in the refrigerator without cleaning it. When I pulled it out today, I did take the tip out to make sure the burger hadn’t turned brown and it was just fine.

I made some muscle cuts last week without the gun and probably do prefer those, but the jerky burger is definitely good and easier to chew

I’m just excited to have a way to use up all this burger that I always end up with.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It had instructions!?

I’ll try what you said. I loathe the task so much that I never really take time to prepare it that well.
 
Joined
Apr 8, 2019
Messages
1,969
OK, I went and watched that video. I was loading these casings totally wrong! I was cutting the casings to the preferred length and then filling them. I didn’t realize you just slide the casing on the tip and start cranking! Now I see how you can tie a knot in them too. Thanks man!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Should save you a bunch of time...
 
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