Beef Jerky…Thank you Tim
March 16, 2010Meg_Kelso No Comments »The next time you bite into a tasty piece of beef jerky, remember to thank men who, long ago, created the very first morsels of what we call a convenient snack. They called it sustenance and relied upon it for meat when fresh meat was rare. It’s difficult to trace back who the first person was to accidentally notice that a piece of meat left out in the sun was actually a tasty little morsel, but it appears as though a few different societies could claim beef jerky as their own.
The most we can be sure of is that the name comes from an Incan tribe called Quechua who called their own version of the cured meat Ch’arki. They used elk, buffalo and deer meat seasoned with salt and for added flavor, they wrapped the meat up in the hide of the animal before drying by sun or by smoking. South Africans also dabbled in the cured meat science, putting the meat in between the saddle of their horse and the horse hide to season and tenderize their version of the staple as they went on long trips, usually to find more meat.
Exploration seems to have encouraged the necessity of drying meats over the centuries. Spanish Conquistador’s who had strips of drying meat hanging off ropes on their boats were surprised to see Native Americans doing the same on land. The Spanish colonized many islands that they encountered with goats which they often used when making their own cured meat.
Chances are we’ll never know who the first person hungry enough to pick a piece of errant meat off of a hot rock was (Let’s call him Tim.) but once he tasted the chewy goodness of dried meat, we can be sure that he was hooked. Had he lived in a capitalist soctiety he could have become rich selling his new discovery, but capitalism would have to wait while many different societies discovered the new method of preparing meat for future use.
Lest you think that beef jerky is a mere snack for under-developed countries, consider this fact…Ch’arki was the first of ALL cured meats and it eventually led to the creation of deli meats and even to sausages. All those foods of today were created using the technology discovered by Tim when, no doubt spurred on by hunger, he reached down and took a chance. Tim might not have been aware of e.coli but I wager he was aware that something bad could potentially happen if he made a poor culinary decision.
As noted before, Tim was, in all likelyhood, extremely hungry when he chose to pick up that very first piece of jerky. But still, like the Conquistadores, he took a chance. Exploration and discovery is ALL over the history of our little snack food.
After the invention of the microscope, smoking became more and more the curing method of choice. That meant that you had to stop longer to build a fire so I guess people had time to talk about their jerky and how to make it better. Although it offends SO many sensibilities, some even pounded the jerky silly and then tried to boil the water back into the meat. If they didn’t care for the dried version of the cured meat, I doubt they liked the boiled method any better.
Anyway, most Americans probably think of cowboys when they think of jerky and history. So, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention our great-great grandfathers and how THEY jerked their own meat.
Yep, from the Lewis and Clark expedition, to the ’49 Gold Rush to driving cattle from Texas to Oklahoma, early Americans depended upon dried meat, and vegetables, whenever they had land to cover that wasn’t dotted with convenience stores along the way. To show their extreme manhood, many early pioneers preferred bigger and thicker pieces of meat when making their own jerky. They ripped large pieces of meat off of a bone and then tied them into huge knots before seasoning and drying. Plans like Manifest Destiny require a lot of big men with big appetites.
Anyway, wherever it came from, it certainly has universal appeal. And the fact that, today, people could go to Burger King but instead choose a nice beef jerky shows that the food itself was more than just a staple of life…with a little thought, a few concepts about germ-free cooking and a seasoning here or there, beef jerky is quite the pleasure for many.
But still, far too often, this noble food is hidden on an endcap near the Miller Lite. It’s just not right, I tell ya…it’s just not right. We owe Tim more than that.
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