r/jerky • u/Prairie-Peppers • 7d ago

Anyone cure with celery juice instead of curing salt?

Recently came across this curing method in some cooking videos and I'm curious if it's viable for jerky. I don't use curing salt anyway since I just make small batches for myself and my friends, but I'm wondering if it'd be a good option in the future since it's hard to find curing salt where I live.

1 Upvotes

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6

u/SaveOurBolts 7d ago

It’s viable, I just wouldn’t use it because it’s impossible (for home hobbyists) to know the concentration of the nitrites/nitrates when using celery or other ‘natural’ cures. If I’m making a slab of bacon or a batch of jerky, I want to know exactly how much cure I’m adding. 

I know you said it’s tough to find curing salt where you live, but if you wanted to try curing I would recommend trying to find a bag of Prague powder #1 online, it’s super cheap and an 8 oz bag will last for years. I have a 5 lb batch of jerky marinading in my fridge right now, and measuring out 1 teaspoon of cure is easy and consistent.

-1

u/Prairie-Peppers 7d ago

For me it's more a matter of being in Canada and voting with my wallet at the moment. I live in a very small village over an hour from any decent sized grocery store and will only buy from Canadian owned stores and non-US producers. I can easily grow my own celery and juice it.

3

u/Aggressive-Let8356 7d ago

Restaurant supply stores tend to carry what you're looking for.

2

u/iiiimagery 7d ago

Try it out

1

u/Prairie-Peppers 7d ago

I will for sure but I'm trying to gather more info before I waste $100 of ingredients and hours of my life.

1

u/iiiimagery 7d ago

Fair. I'd just try it on a a few spare strips on your next batch. So you'd still get to try it out but not risk an entire batch

2

u/hammong 7d ago

You can generally buy curing salt in any Walmart or grocery store ... in the canning department. It won't be sold near the other "salt" to dissuade people from accidentally buying it thinking it's Himalayan Pink Salt or some other nutritive salt that ends up poisoning people.

Most commercial recipes that use celery for the nitrate source are using powder because of complexities in measuring the amount of nitrates to do the job properly.

1

u/jacksraging_bileduct 7d ago

My wife gets headaches from the curing salt, and I found a product called ecocure #1 and it’s expensive for what it is, but it lasts a long time and let’s me make bacon she can eat, and it’s nitrate free.

1

u/Responsible_Worry934 6d ago

I would use celery powder instead of juice, personally. I work at a butcher shop and make a lot of sausage. When customers started complaining about the use of nitrates, we switched to a celery cure. it’s a very concentrated celery powder. Still has nitrates in it, but they are “naturally occurring” so we can say “no nitrates added” 🤪🤣

1

u/Meinertzhagens_Sack 5d ago

Use celery salt