Ground jerky cured for 3 days?

[lamurscrappy]

So im curious what peoples thoughts are on this. I make ground and formed jerky with which i use sodium nitrite for. The minimum realistically is 12 hours and the nitrite has performed its duty on the meat. But is there a maximum time you can have jerky curing before any ill effects from the cure? I have let ground venison cure for three days after being seasoned and the jerky still turns out just fine. Thoughts?

[Jonathon]

lamurscrappy You are correct that 12 hours is the minimum time for the cure to work if you do not add any encapsulated citric acid. Part of this answer is going to depend on what your process is and how much water you use when marinating the jerky. If you are adding a lot of water then I would say around 3 days is the max I would wait as the nitrite is going to convert to nitric oxide and eventually “gas out” and it will be sitting in a mixture of water and seasoning that no longer has an active cure. If you add very little water to it then this isn’t really a concern. Either way, 3 days wouldn’t put me off too much too far beyond that and i’d start getting nervous. The one thing that you might see is a lack of redness to the meat and with jerky that isnt really a concern anyway!

[lamurscrappy]

Thanks jonathon! Its good to see insight in this. I actually use no water and only a small amount of liguid smoke as i use powdered smoke. Its good to know their wont be any poor effects persay on the meat!