Pork Jerky 自製豬肉乾

We went to BSJ’s house for New Year’s Eve party after dinner. Even though I was quite full from dinner at my in-laws’, I could not resist trying the homemade beef jerky at the party. I didn't know it could be done at home. Ho LOVES pork jerky, oh I have to try that some time! Since I couldn’t wait to ask the friend how she made them, I went on the internet to search for the recipe. Bless the technology, I found several recipes with photos! Reading from the comments posted, the successful rate is quite high. The instructions are not complicated either. Thinking it would be a good CNY presents for families this weekend, I gave it a try.  LOL, after giving up my exercise and sleeping time to make these, I realized the CNY eve dinner is the weekend after!

2nd batch

Ingredients:
Ground pork 500g
Ham (minced) 100g
Sugar 85g (I reduced the sugar from original recipe)
Honey 1 big Tbsp
Fish Sauce (魚露) 2 Tbsp
Shaoxing Cooking Wine (紹興酒) 1 Tbsp
Vegetable Oil 1 Tbsp
White Pepper ½ Tsp (Optional)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 320F.
2. Mix all ingredients in mixer for 2 mins.
3. Put one big scoop of mixture on parchment paper lined baking sheet.
4. Cover with plastic wrap and roll out to 3-4mm thick.
5. Put in centre of the oven for 15 mins.
6. Cut the pork into squares with pizza cutter.
7. Set oven to grill on Hi, put the baking sheet in for 3 – 3.5 mins.
8. Turn the jerky over and grill for 3 – 3.5 mins again.
9. The colour will darken after.

Depending on your oven, the grilling time may vary.


Before it went in the oven for the first time

I followed the original recipe to pan sear the first batch.  They got burnt very quickly.  The picture below shows the ones I had left.  I decided to use the oven grill method in the second batch and they came out just right. Each batch yields about 30 pieces of 2” x 2” squares.



First batch, some burnt marks, actually more on the reverse side of some

 Ho is very happy that he doesn’t need to spend $$$ to buy pork jerky at the stores anymore. I spent only about 1/4 of the money to get the same quantity.  The taste is very close to what’s being sold at stores. Now that we can make them at home, we can adjust the saltiness and sweetness according to our preference too.