Weather Got You Down? Cheer up with Oven Jerky!

Saturday we woke up to 11 inches of snow, and a request to let the public works people get the roads cleaned up by staying home. So we decided to make oven jerky, a dish that's tasty but time consuming to make. Since we had ample warning of the potential storm, I assembled my ingredients beforehand. Even when the electricity goes out, our good old gas range keeps on going.

Ingredients

2lbs. of beef (or chicken, turkey, salmon). I chose a London broil.
1 bottle of Gyoza Dipping Sauce
1/3 cup Worcestershire Sauce
1 TBSP black pepper

Preperation

Freeze the meat for a couple of hours to get it a little more than half frozen. This helps you to slice the meat in thin pieces. It took my 2 lb. roast about 2 and a quarter hours. Slice it against the grain.
Prepare your brine: Just mix the above ingredients into a bowl. Add the meat and brine into a ziploc bag and let it marinate for 4 or 5 hours, turning it over occasionally to penetrate the meat.

I dried my jerky on racks that were placed on a cookie sheet, with a papertowel underneath to catch the drips. Set the oven at 150 degrees. Place a rolled up towel between the door and the oven so that it is open just a little, say 1/4 inch. This produces a warm "drying" effect instead of baking it. Let it dry for 1.5 hours and then use tongs to turn it over. I reversed my two pans, from the top rack to the bottom and vice versa. Let dry another hour to 1.5 hours to get to the texture you prefer. I like mine tough, to crispy, so 3 hours was about right. The final product turned out to be delicious.

My jerky is flavored the way I like it, salty and spicy. If you want less salt, you could cut the brine with a little water. Be sure not to feed the jerky to your pets! Remember, a little salt goes a long ways for an animal that ways around 20 or 30 pounds. Instead, make a separate amount of dried meat just for your critters' pleasure.

Making this jerky on a cold winter's day reminds me of fun snowy weather when I was a kid. We used to sled ride all day long. Sometimes we'd take our sleds into the woods, which was a real no-no with my mom. And usually, we'd slide right into a tree. We'd come home with knots on our head and she'd stand there like a towering inferno, hands at her waist, glaring at us. "You've been sled riding in the woods haven't you?" And then we'd have to stay in the yard for the rest of the week. It's amazing we ever survived child hood. Next time, I'll tell you about my uncle hauling us on ropes behind his pickup so we didn't have to walk up the best sledding hill...... yeah, it is amazing I'm still here to tell you about it. Bon appetit! And don't forget to feed my fish!

Lean mean Thanksgiving

We were late cooking our Thanksgiving Day meal because we were out of town on the real holiday enjoying social times with my nephew and his family. But today, we outdid ourselves on our own Holiday meal. We made it lean and mean, although let's be honest, there is a substantial amount of butter in the dressing. It *is* a holiday, you know. But this is what we had.

Turkey with dressing. I found a multi-grain cranberry stuffing mix made by Mrs. Cubberley, more well known for her croutons. I added pecans, and some sauteed celery and onions, a cup of chicken stock, and butter. I also added a teaspoon of sage, although the mix had some in it, there's never enough. They should put that on my tombstone.....Theres Never Enough Sage, RIP Robin Odach.

We had big plump asparagus we found at Costco. I skinned the bottoms, sprayed it with pam and roasted it with a little parmesan sprinkles and sea salt. I did make gravy from the drippings, but I only used 2 T. of flour and a little water, so it was more like a sauce than the usual congealed mess all over the plate. That was the brunt of dinner.

I made Paul a sweet potato pie from Alton Brown's recipe. It was low fat. I steamed 3 sweet potatos that were chunked up, added 3/4 cup of brown sugar, pumpkin spices and a cup of yogurt. It looks very good and really doesn't contain any fat except for whatever is in the crust.

Since January 5th I've sustained a 3 pound weight loss per month. It may be the slowest diet on earth but it's a weight loss that will stay put because I've learned a new way to eat over the past year. By my scales at home I've lost 34 pounds, but my doctor only credits me with 32 because she won't give me credit for 2 pounds of clothing. Well.... she's a skinny little thing, what does she know?

So what was your favorite lean mean dish this Thanksgiving?