Jerky Marinade Question

[ironhorse07]

Awhile back I ordered some AC stuff from Columbia Spice and they will ship up to 24 bags in a flat rate box, sweet! So I also picked up a few bags of AC OP jerky seasonings, why not. Anyway when you look at the directions, they are for a vacuum tumbler,  which I don't have 

, and the first batch of 2.5 lbs that I mixed up to try looked really dry. That batch I mixed in a ziplock, squished around occasionally for 24 hrs and turned out fine. However, this time I was wanting to speed things up with the marinade bowl for my Foodsaver. So my question is, if the marinade looks dry in this 2.5 lb batch and I bump up the water, do I also proportionally increase the spice block and leave the cure #1 the same or increase the amount of cure #1 also? Or just increase the water? The more I ponder it the more I confuse myself.

Thanks,

Doug

 

[forluvofsmoke]

How much water per pound of meat do the instructions call for? I generally use 3-4 oz water per pound and the recommended amount of cure. I vary the water quantity depending on how much spices I use in my own recipes. It will look somewhat dry after tossing the meat to mix everything together, and that's fine. Be sure you get even coverage on the meat with the spice/cure/water mix by tumbling or tossing very well, but do not increase the amount of cure if you use a bit of extra water...the amount of cure is used by weight of meat, not water, unless you're doing a brine/cure with large whole muscle meats, which is a totally different situation altogether.

Eric

 

[ironhorse07]

Post probably could have been written clearer. When you use the proportions on the bag it works out to 2.5 to 2.6 oz nt wt of water, depending on which flavor, or about 2/3 cup. The bag also states this is for a revolving vacuum marinator. At the recommended amount of water there is very little excess liquid. Ok for a ziplock or marinator where your moving it around. My concern is that if I use the quick marinate canister for my Foodsaver there might not be enough liquid to adequatelly disperse the seasonings and cure. My question is how much extra liquid one can add without any effect. For instance, if I double the water do I also double the seasonings also, and what about the cure then? Is this getting closer to a brine? Or just add enough extra water to cover and press on? Ultimately I could use this as an excuse to get a Lyco. :biggrin: