Well, I finally got around to trying tjr's version of Eldons dried beef recipe. You can find it in the archives here under: tjr's dried beef I used Eldon's brine recipe to the tee, and tjrs method of smoking it in smokette. tjr left a couple ingredients that eldon used out of his recipe that I wanted to include. Personal preference is all.

Last Saturday I brined a 5+ pound top round roast.

Took it out of the brine this past Saturday morning. Dried it off. and put in smoker at 9:45 at 125 for 1 hour without any wood in the wood box.

Then after the 1st hour I added 2 oz of apple and 2 oz of cherry and left the stat set at 125 for 2 more hours.

At the beginning of the 4th hour I cranked it up to 165. tjr says to leave it there until the internal reaches 155.

Well.......This brings us upto 6:00 PM Saturday afternoon and the meat has only risen to 144, and I'm getting thirsty so I go to the local watering hole to have a couple. But before I do I crank up the smoker to about 170 to get past the plateau. I get back at 9:45 PM and sure enough the internal had jumped past the 155 mark and went to 162.

So I move onto tjr's next step. I turn the stat back down to 150 and let her go for 24 hours.

Sunday after the Super Bowl I pulled the now less than 3 lb. roast from the smoker and put it in the frige to chill. And if anyone can tell me what time the game was over I'd appreciate it so I can finish my notes. The Super Bowl Party at the local VFW can make one tend to not pay attention to the clock!

This evening after work I will use the slicer to slice it deli thin and have the 1st taste test. I'll try to get some pics and maybe smokin will post them for me.

Well the meat slice beautifully. It had that reddish dried beef look all the way through for the most part.
There was however a thin line of just greyish brown tht didnt take on a red hue. This line was only evident inthe very center of the thickest few inches of the roast. I even injected some of the brine into the meat. So I dont know what the issue is there. It still tastes the same as the rest of the meat though, which is like old fasioned dried beef.
Think I might make some cream of dried beef for breakfast!
Overall, I call it a success, and will do it again soon. Right after I do pastrami. Next time though I wil do 10 lbs or more at once.