Brad Makes Beef Jerky

You ever eat heart before, Vince?

(laughing)

(deep, demonic laughing)

Hey guys, today on It's Alive,

we're gonna be doing a little beef jerky.

Um, okay.

(upbeat music)

You don't want a piece of meat that's

real marbly and fatty because in the drying and preserving,

which essentially is what we're doing with jerky,

fat will go rancid.

So you want to get like a nice lean cut of beef.

This is called an eye round of beef.

I'll trim off this little fat cap

and then we'll slice that up.

We're gonna make two types of jerky today, Vince.

We're gonna make a traditional one,

which I like to call the Old Timer,

and then we're gonna make another one,

it's a little funkier, it's got some different flavors

going on and we're gonna call that one Bringin' the Funk.

(funky music)

We'll get into that, let me trim the fat, Vinny,

you know what I mean?

A lot easier trimmin' fat off of this

than this, you know what I mean, Vinny?

Nice.

So, very important, Vince.

Come on in here, bud.

So, as you--

(crashing and cat meow)

Jesus!

So you can see, Vin, I don't know if you can check this in,

zoom in, bud.

So you can see the grain on the meat.

Just like when you're cutting a steak,

you want to cut it against the grain

so it'll break apart easier

instead of having to shred long.

That's the way I like it.

If you feel like cutting it the other way,

knock yourself out but I highly recommend

going against the grain.

(ominous music)

Delany.

(ominous music)

Smells great.

So look, I like to cut about an eight of an inch thick

'cause it's gonna shrink when it dehydrates.

I don't want something real thin, you know,

that's gonna dry out and turn into cardboard.

So we're gonna cut this up into equal parts.

I'll put half into this one, the Old Timer,

and half into Bringin' the Funk.

Alright, Salt Bae?

We're coming for you, Salt Bae!

He's better.

Yes, it's cutting up real nice.

I mean, other than this, if you wanted to get nutty,

you can go cutting that out 'cause it will,

but it's fine, I mean, it's fine.

I grew up making jerky, Vince.

I don't know about you, but my dad,

we always used to make venison jerky

'cause he was a deer hunter and so was I.

I'm starting to get back into it now

but I got out of it for a while.

We'll save that for another campfire story, Vince.

What?

What did you say?

Oh, yeah, whatever that means.

Wish I could speak another language, huh Vin.

This one's for you, Salt Bae.

(laughing)

I'm never doing that again.

Alright (bleep)us, now here we go.

(bleep)us.

It means focus.

In Jersey.

Oh look at this, Vinny.

I did this for you, oh.

(romantic music)

Sst.

So we got two flavors like I was saying.

We're gonna do, first let's do the Old Timer.

So I'm doing a little riff on like

the traditional kind of flavor

that I used to do with my dad back when I was younger.

So this about, this is one quarter cup of

Worc-shu-shu-shu-shu-shu-shu-shu-shire sauce.

We're gonna go ahead and pour that right in, okay?

Ah yeah, quarter cup maple syrup.

Okay.

Oh, okay.

This here I got a teaspoon and a half, salt.

Fresh ground Tel, Teli, Tellicherry black pepper.

I'll sprinkle that right in there.

Onion and garlic powder, big fans.

Alright.

Chili powder, I love this stuff.

A little cayenne pepper for some kick.

A little dried oregano.

Bum, bum, bum!

And now here's for the wild card, Vinny.

I got some capers, alright?

Kinda like gettin' into like a little tar,

like I pulled this from like tar,

like a tartare, beef tartare recipe kind of thing.

Just gonna chop those up real nice.

I love capers.

That'll bring a nice little flavor to it, too.

A nice little funk.

And then, for the last secret ingredient,

I got a little bit of the caper juice.

We're gonna pour that right in there, alright?

So we'll just give that a good mix.

And this meat just soaks up the marinade.

It's such a flavorful recipe.

Alright, so that's the Old Timer.

Oh, that's the stuff!

Recipe number two.

Bringin' the Funk.

I got one Fresno chile.

I took the top off, I'm gonna leave the seeds in.

Uhhhh.

Am I gonna leave the seeds in?

Yeah we'll leave the seeds in.

Just gonna give it a crush.

Just to get things opened up a little, alright?

I'm gonna throw that right into the meat.

Okay.

Let me get rid of that real quick, Vin.

Alright, why don't you take two?

Get a glass of water.

So we got our Fresno.

I got an inch and a half, two inch piece of ginger.

Just gonna crush it.

(heart monitor beeping)

One, two, three.

(heart monitor long beep)

Oh it's dead.

Alright, here we go.

Just gonna bruise it up a little.

Alright.

Love that, ginger in there nice.

I got some garlic that I already allic-ified.

Just crushed, I got about three and a half, four cloves.

Allic-ify?

Oh, you know what it means, Vince.

So it's when you crush the (laughing),

don't make me do this.

When you crush the garlic, it,

no I'm not doing it, Vince.

(powerful music swelling)

[Whispering Voice] Crush the garlic.

Release the allicin.

Wanna piece?

Whoa, whoa, a little piece, bud!

Huh huh!

Oh, it's spicy.

Next.

A little Chinese five spice powder.

Ta ta ta.

How's it goin'?

(dinosaur roaring)

Great work yesterday.

Quarter cup soy sauce.

Next.

Honey.

Two quarts of honey, no I'm just kidding.

We're gonna put, you know, let's say,

let's say two and a half, three tablespoons.

Oh, this is that good stuff.

That bee local, baby.

Oh, that's the gold.

Oh, oh, oh.

(dog howling)

Yeahhh!

(both howling)

(howling)

Yeah, it was like a bloodhound, right?

Or a basket hound.

One of them hound dogs with the big ears, freakin'.

(howling)

I want a dog so bad.

Alright here we go.

We're gonna add that right to in here.

Right to in here.

Next.

Little Gochujang, good stuff.

It's a Korean condiment.

You can get this actually, you can get this online,

or in some Asian markets by you or supermarkets,

they usually have them in there.

It'll give it some color, it'll give it some body.

It's just, it's great on something like this.

We're gonna add a quarter cup of the Gochujang.

Four tablespoons, Vince.

I know you were wondering.

Alright, next.

This is why we're calling it Bringin' the Funk.

A little fish sauce.

I'm gonna do ten dashes, you ready?

One, two, three, four, five, six,

seven, eight, nine, 10.

11.

One more for good measure.

And then we're just gonna mix this up, alright?

What am I doing with this?

Alright, let's do it by hand.

Get the hell out of here with that thing.

Ahh, that's the stuff.

That's a new angle for us, Vince.

Like I don't know, I kinda,

I feel like I do it sometimes.

Uh, today, we're gonna be making.

You said, you said Babish.

I wasn't British.

Store in fridge for 24 hours.

That's for you, Babby.

We're gonna throw this in a Ziploc,

I like to just take all the oxygen out

and just keep it real nice.

I'm gonna go grab two bags, alright Vinny?

Hate to break up the party.

You're missin' out, bud.

Am I?

This goes into the fridge, overnight.

I don't like to do more than overnight

'cause it can start to get a little weird and mealy.

It just doesn't need it.

To the walk-in, Vinny.

After you.

Don't touch anything.

What is this (bleep), this don't go here.

You know!

So tune in tomorrow, Vinny, come back.

We'll throw it in the dehydrator.

Cover all that, temperature, time, et cetera.

That's it.

You can go home, you did great today.

(knocking on door)

No no no no.

Get out!

(smooth music)

There's a lot of (bleep)in' stuff in here, Morocco!

(coughing)

God damn, son.

Whole lotta chicken in there.

A whole freakin' half a ham.

I guess he's aging it.

I don't care anymore.

I don't care anymore!

(laughing)

No I do, I care a lot.

I love caring.

(sweet piano music)

Alright.

Our jerky, I pulled it out of the fridge,

wanted to let it come to room temp a little bit,

you don't have to do that but I got a little excited

as one does when making jerky.

Come on Vin, check it out.

That's the stuff.

Now, we got that fancy dehydrator.

Here Vinny, let me show you something.

You can use any kind of dehydrator.

Some ovens even have, some of these newer ovens

even have it, if you go looking at the settings.

Do do do do.

They have a little dehydration setting.

(dinosaur roaring)

Yeah, so we got this nice, it's alright, this dehydrator.

Really need a new one, I wanna nice one

where I can get real technical with the temperature.

So I got it set up, I'm trying to dial in,

all's it has is low and high,

that's not very helpful.

So I'm trying to figure out my own temperatures.

I like about, you know, 140 is what I've been doing.

I don't want it to get real leathery and dried out too fast,

it's like a nice and slow.

We're in the market for a new one, Vinny,

but this'll do for now.

Oh hold on, this is under tight wraps.

It's gonna be black garlic.

See ya in a month.

Yeah, and then I got this little temperature gauger in here.

I think they call 'em thermometers.

Let's go load up the trays, Vinny.

When you go layin' these out on your racks,

you don't want 'em to be touching.

No overlaps, no little shingling effects, alright?

We're not roofing houses.

Oh yeah, Vinny, this is it.

Oh it's a lovely bag of death.

Also grains, everything's just kinda soaked up all that,

all that moisture and flavor, all that marinade,

like a little sponge.

Yeah, the vibe down here, pretty nice, you know?

It's Thursday.

Summer's winding down.

Or just kicking up, whatever you're into.

Always been a glass half full kinda guy myself, you know?

You know what we don't need in jerky making?

Is negativity.

Alright, this ain't a selp, selp helf video.

Actually, yeah, it kinda is.

Fermentin' stuff, we're helpin' you, we're helping,

yeah, this is definitely a selp helf video.

Self help!

What did I say?

Selp help?

Self help.

This is definitely a self help video.

Selp help.

We're, English has never been my strongest language.

Oh, yeah.

Ed Geen!

Or Gein, what was his name?

You know, that crazy serial,

that dude that was killing people,

back in the day, and like, makin' lampshades and (bleep)

out of the skin.

(demonic laughter)

Masks n' stuff.

Anyway.

Don't do that.

So.

On the Gochujang fish sauce funk master,

I'm just gonna put a little sesame seeds on this.

And I didn't want 'em to end up on the Old Timer.

He's a little cranky, he don't like sesame.

Digestion issue.

Alright, Salt Bae, I'm the Sesame Bae.

I'm gonna go throw this in the,

here watch, I'll show you Vin, never mind.

God, I gotta explain everything.

Look, so.

When I'm putting this on the next layer.

Look, all the little runoff doesn't end up

on the Old Timers.

I'm gonna throw these into the old dehydrator, Vinny.

Look at that, baby.

There's your thumbnail.

Jerky.

Alright.

Foolin' around.

We don't play with our food.

One, two, three.

Oh, it's dead.

I wish sometimes I had like three arms.

Great.

140 degrees.

About three, four hours.

It's, time is it?

Okay, it's 10:40.

That took a while.

It's 10:40.

I'll call you, come back down,

maybe we'll check it out at around, you know uh,

three o' clock?

2:30?

Alright.

I'll give you a call.

(whispers) Call me.

(smooth music)

Oh yeah, mama.

Look at that nice.

That's what I'm talkin' about.

Here, let's bring 'em over to the,

let's bring 'em over to the spot.

Chris, how ya doin'?

The thing with jerky, when you're dehydrating it

is, you know, you might think it's not done

because it's still hot and kind of pliable.

But once it cools off it usually will firm up.

I like to keep 'em in an airtight container

so that the little bit of moisture,

even though we dehydrated 'em, they're not completely dry.

So some of that moisture will help,

just kinda like mildly rehydrate it in a very nice way.

Yeah, let's pull these off.

And if there's any thick ones that don't seem done

we'll pop 'em back in.

Yeah, this is lookin' good.

Marination just kinda penetrated all the way through.

Oh, Amiel, what's up babe?

You like jerky, jerky?

Oh.

So Amiel, we got two different types here.

Ah, hee hee hoo!

That was a mouthful.

Yeah, you really went

for it. I shouldn't have

done that like that.

Mm.

But it's good, I get the fish sauce a little bit.

Little heat, great flavor.

Delicious.

Thanks, bud.

Now, hear me out real quick.

Off the bat.

Maybe a little dry.

You throw 'em in a Ziploc.

They give off a little bit of their own moisture.

And it'll be a whole different texture.

These are like the first jerkies that I've really,

really loved.

It's good, Brad!

We're not paying him.

You did a good job.

Yeah! Proud of you.

Thanks, bud.

Thanks for playin'.

Hey, Baraghani!

This is good, I think they went a little too long.

Well hear me out.

I was just-- 'Cause I tried the

earlier version. Right, but you

tried them out of the bag.

In a couple hours, I should just get

a little recording saying this.

Agree, it probably coulda went 30 minutes less.

Flavor's great.

Thank you.

Alright, thanks for playin'.

Two for two.

Wait.

Two for two.

RK?

We gotta call her.

Vince, to the telephones.

(superhero theme music)

We call one Miss Rachel Karten.

I heard she's a major jerky fan.

Alright, let's call her.

What's her number?

Okay.

She better pick up.

Hey Rachel, it's Brad.

Down from the test kitchen.

So, let me just give you the quick shpiel.

Okay.

(squeaky tape noises)

We should've let everyone taste it after the bag.

It's not that dry!

Alright, it's a little dry.

You like? This is my favorite.

You like that better?

That's the Old Timer.

Oh, for a good, good while.

I've been eatin' the same batch I made last week.

Mhm.

You know, that's, this is an ancient method

of preserving meat.

You throw it in your saddle while you're

crossing the uh, Great Divide back

in the day. As one does.

Yeah, Lois and Clark, they had jerky.

Lois and Clark?

Louis, that's what I said.

Like I said, maybe we'll get a little,

I'll have Vinny come down in an hour or so

and we can do a real quick out of the bag comparison.

(smooth music)

Vinny, can you hear me?

Wink if it's a yes.

Wink twice if you need help.

Oh, (bleep).

So we put the jerky back into the,

it went into our bags.

Remember when it came out, it was a little,

a little darker, you definitely couldn't do that.

Remember?

Yeah, you remember.

Oh, home run derby.

All day, baby.

It's gone.

No, no, no, no.

Alright, Mr. Editor?

Look.

Old Timer.

Was a little drier, remember, on the outside?

Now look.

Look at that.

You like that?

Yeah.

Right.

It's not cardboard by any means.

We're flexing.

It's so good, right?

Yep.

A lot.

Famous words of Chris Morocco, flavor's got nowhere to hide.

Great.

So yeah.

Keep it in a bag, you know?

Store it.

You don't wanna put it in the fridge

and then take it out for two days,

put it in the fridge, take it out,

'cause it's gonna sweat and I don't know,

things'll go a little funky.

Just eat it or, you know, keep it at room temperature.

Or Google it.

I'd love to know if you guys are willing to share

some of your secret ingredients

or preferred flavor profiles for jerky

or anything like that, or anything else

you'd like to see us fool around wit' and ferment.

Time's flyin', bud, we gotta go, so.

Jerky.

Bon appetit.

Claire's in Alaska.

Lucky dog.

I remember Alaska.

Hey guys, today on It's Alive, we're gonna,

oh god, oh god!

Jerry likes jerky.

I don't know, he's dead.

Didn't get a chance to ask him.

Yeah, babe, Edgevale, boom, Jerry!

Tony!

Whoa, whoa, get out of there, Lau!

Yeah, you can't just go shopping.

This ain't, this ain't.

He's got no respect.

Ho ho ho, I get no respect.

(laughing)

Vinny said I sounded like Rodney Dangerfield

once or twice too.

I don't know if that's an insult or not.

(laughing)

Is he dead?

What do you mean, of course?

We got no time for weekend,

nature don't care about the week.

You know what happens to the week?

(clicking)

Damn, Andy, you're supposed to be,

this is the self, self help video.

(smooth music)