Jerky Adventures!

So a few days ago Wyatt and I were sitting on the couch eating jerky. I pretty much couldn't stop so I ate the entire rest of the bag. I was like," let's go buy a new bag and eat it." Wyatt brought to my attention that the bag he brought was $12!!!! I was just floored by how much that bag of jerky cost. I have been wanting to make jerky for some time now but have never gotten around to it. I told Wyatt that we should just buy meat and make our own jerky. He thought that was a good idea so I told my mom to pick up some meat on her shops and we looked up the recipe online. I found a recipe that said,"You do not need a dehydrator to make this flavorful beef jerky at home. Make it in the oven. However, you may certainly use this marinade on beef used in a dehydrator.

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 4 hours
Total Time: 4 hours, 15 minutes Ingredients:
1 pound boneless top round steak or London broil, trimmed of fat
1/4 cup liquid smoke
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
1-1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper, or to taste
Preparation:
Wrap beef in plastic wrap and freeze 30 to 60 minutes until firm, but not rock hard. (This makes it easier to slice evenly.) Using a sharp knife, slice the beef across the grain into thin strips about 1/4-inch thick.
Place liquid smoke, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, and cayenne pepper in a large zip-top freezer bag. Seal and squish to combine. Place beef strips in the marinade, re-seal, and toss to coat. Open bag, squeeze out all the air, seal, and refrigerate for 12 hours or overnight.
Preheat oven to 250 F.
Drain meat strips from marinade and pat dry with paper towels. Place a baking rack inside a jellyroll pan. Arrange beef strips on the rack in a single layer with room in between for air circulation. Bake for about 4 hours, until dry to the touch. Remove from oven and let air-dry in a cool dry place for another 24 hours."

taken from http://homecooking.about.com/od/beefrecipes/r/blbeef103.htm

Since I had never done this before, I printed out the recipe and looked it over as well as looked at what ingredients I had and didn't have. For one, I didn't have liquid smoke. Plus, while I was looking at the comments, a person said that it makes the jerky taste weird to have it anyways. Then, I realized that I didn't have any Worcestershire sauce either. Wyatt but up the meat or me because that is super nasty to touch raw meat. Then, he pounded then with a tenderizer to make it flatter and seem like more meet than it really is.
I started on the marinate. I grabbed a gallon freezer baggie and poured some soy sauce in it, some teriyaki sauce in it, salt, cayenne pepper, pepper from pizza places, pepper kernel, garlic powder, onion powder, jerk seasonings, and steak seasoning into the first batch. Since this was only one piece of meat, this didn't seem to be making very much jerky pieces so I asked my mom to grab me another piece of meat while she is at the store.
It was around 9:20 pm last night when my mom got home from her shops. We saw the meat and decided that since the meat had to marinade overnight, we should make the other piece so we have more. Wyatt again cut the meat and I made another batch of the seasoning. My mom also picked up some Worcestershire sauce so we thought we should pitch that in. It only took us a few minutes to make this batch.
Today after I got home from school, we put the pieces on a the tray and put them in the oven at 250 degrees for 4 hours. When it was at roughly 2 and a half hours in when we decided to check it. They were getting pretty dry so we decided to pull them out of the oven. I would have kept them in for 2 hours or and hr and half because they are a bit too dry. The kind without the Worcestershire sauce batch was not as good as the other batch so next time we will nix that ingredient. Also, they were a bit salty so we will cut the salt out and possible cut down on the teriyaki and soy sauce. Overall, this was a wonderful experience!! I highly recommend that you guys try this. Feel free to use my modified recipe and let me know what you think. I hope you are all having a wonderful day just like me.