With the recent price-hike of beef, this snack has become a delicacy and quite an art to prepare at home.
Today I share with you a traditional home-made Biltong recipe; all these ingredients are easily obtained from your local supermarket and will require a little patience.
Brine
- 60 ml white wine vinegar
- 3 tbsp worcestershire sauce
Biltong
- 1.2 kilograms Topside Beef, or Silverside, cut into (long) lengths
Spice mix
- 1 tbsp semi-coarse sea salt
- 60 ml brown sugar
- 1 tbsp BBQ spice
- 125 ml coriander seeds, toasted and coarsely ground
- 1 tsp milled black pepper
Plus:
- 1 lamp with a 40 watt daylight bulb (don’t use a high wattage bulb as it will waste electricity)
- Electric fan
- Paper clips
- Newspaper or foil
- Clothes rack or something suitable for hanging meat
Method
Biltong basics:
- Use good quality meat, like topside (with the hood removed) or silverside (with the eye removed).
- Remove all visible sinew from meat and trim off excess fat.
- Cut meat into thinner, smaller pieces to promote even drying (1.5-2cm thick, 4-5cm wide and 10 -15cm long is optimum).
- Always cut meat along the grain as you’ll be cutting it across the grain when you eat it.
- Marinate/brine meat for at least 4 hours (or up to 2 days) to allow flavour to be absorbed.
- Make sure you hang biltong in a cool and well-ventilated spot, out of reach of animals and biltong thieves!
- Drying time depends on the moisture levels of the air where the biltong is hanging. The drier the air, the sooner it’ll be ready.
Step 1:
- Pour vinegar and Worcestershire sauce into a roasting tray.
- Toss meat in brine to coat.
- Lay meat in a single layer.
Step 2:
- Mix spice mix ingredients together.
- Thoroughly coat meat with spice mix and press spices into meat.
- Turn meat over and repeat until all the spice mix is used up.
- Allow to brine for at least 4 hours or overnight, turning as regularly as possible.
Step 3:
- Cover area below hanging surface with foil or a thick layer of newspaper.
- Place lamp just in front of hanging area (hot air will rise and be blown over the biltong by the fan).
- Bend paper clips to form hooks. Place a hook into each piece of biltong. Hang biltong 5cm apart on clothes rack.
- Position fan to blow over biltong.
- Dry for 4 -7 days with lamp and fan and until desired dryness is reached.
ohmyfeastSA 
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