Posts Tagged ‘Beef’

In 1968′s 2001: A Space Odyssey, man’s ape-like predecessors come across a giant, dark monolith which jump-starts the evolutionary process and paves the way for incredible technological advances. When we stumbled upon today’s giant, dark rectangular  product, while we didn’t experience any radical improvements ourselves, we did start hollering a bit and immediately plunked down the $2 to purchase the next evolutionary stage in dried meat products.

Ladies and gentleman, I give you…
(cue Also Sprach Zarathustra)

Arizona Jack’s Super Giga Bite Beef Jerky (Peppered, for your pleasure).
Purchased at: Valley Liquidation
Price: $1.99

While the picture may not look that impressive, I assure you, despite the 3.25 oz weight, this is an approximately 2 foot long, 6″ wide piece of beef jerky (132 sq in) that has also been branded (literally) with the initials AZJ (for “Arizona Jack’s”). Before this moment, I never thought I’d get the chance to eat a product with the phrase “super giga” in the name, so history was made today. After doing some official Internet Research®, I discovered that we weren’t the only discerning connoisseurs to try this product. At a MSRP of about $6, the $1.99 price was a steal.

Beef Sourced from Uruguay, Brazil or USA – how can we lose?

A quick peek at the back uncovered that the entire thing only had 210 calories for the entire strip (belt?) and the text boasts of a “REALLY REALLY GOOD TASTE!” (apparently the packaging of lots of the things we eat have to assure us that they are, in fact, actually good). While we did have the option of just rolling it up and stuffing the entire thing in our mouths, but we decided to have fun with it.

The Beef Jerky Bandana® (no relation to the Lady Gaga Meat Dress®)

All crazy costuming aside, this beef jerky was actually palatable (though the embedded crosshatching texture from pressing the meat made for an interesting eating experience) and was better than I expected for a brand that I had never heard of. But if anything, we had a more enjoyable time using it as a prop. Personally, I usually make my own beef jerky because I’m: 1. cheap and 2. I usually don’t add any sweeteners and anything more complicated that salt, pepper and maybe some garlic. Since this jerky has some wonderful little touches like sugar, corn syrup solids, “spice”, apple cider vinegar and our good friend monosodium glutamate, it was a bit different than what I’m used to. However, if I did have a hankerin’ for another meat belt for casually eating, I’d probably pick another one up again for $1.99, but unfortunately, not for $6.

Product: Golden Valley Natural Xtreme Shreds Shredded Jerky
Purchased at: McGregor’s Discount Natural and Organic Foods
Price: $1.00

Marisa’s Take: Lots of products come in tubes nowadays: yogurt, candy, the Internet. But I had never seen beef jerky in a tube until I came across this product. In addition to coming in a tube, it also comes with a carabiner attached. I can’t deny the awesomeness of a dried meat product that is sold under the pre-conceived notion that you will clip it to your belt loop and take it with you skateboarding and other EXTREME (sorry, XTREME) activities.

Golden Valley Natural Xtreme (yes, with an X) Shredded Jerky (or “Shreds”) is pretty RADICAL for coming in a tube so you can eat it on the go. You don’t even have to touch it! I’ve seen shredded jerky sold before, but it’s usually packaged like snus in a plastic container.

Since the jerky inside is concealed by the label, I didn’t really now what to expect when we unwrapped it and popped the lid off. It actually kind of reminds me of brown, puffy insulation. In fact, the jerky seems to be much less “shredded” than it is “powdered”. You could technically snort it and get an XTREME beef jerky high (not suggested).

Yes, it's that extreme.

The taste is pretty similar to regular beef jerky (ingredients include soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce and smoke flavoring), but the texture kind of throws you for a loop. You mouth is coated with a fine beef powder instead of gnawing on a piece. All available methods of eating it seem awkward, whether you tip the open tube into your mouth, stick your tongue inside and grab some or pour it into the palm of your hand and shotgun it. Odds are, you’re likely to get powdered jerky residue other places than your mouth (great if you’re a dog/cat owner).

Golden Valley also sells a buffalo shredded jerky (which I have tried previously) but for all intents and purposes, it tastes pretty much the taste. It also comes packaged the exact same way….except there’s a buffalo skateboarding. ROCK ON!

Ben’s Take: The 1990s was the Era of Xtreme. No, not the Era of Extreme Energy… That’s the 2000s.  No, it was the era that extreme sports entered into the mainstream. Monster  trucks, BMX and skateboarding really took off during the 90s. Other extreme activities that really took off during the 90s include extreme Internet, extreme inhalation, and extreme investing.

After the 2000s figured out that it was tired of extreme investing, the whole extreme business fell apart. There just wasn’t any more money to be had marketing extreme UNTIL NOW!!!!!!!111111. Enter Golden Valley Natural Xtreme Shreds Shredded Jerky. It’s Xtreme. It’s Natural. It’s shredded dude beef. Wait, I meant beef, dude.  I’m a little rusty on my 1990s terminology. Sorry.

Golden Valley Natural Xtreme Shreds Shredded Jerky is a shredded meat product who’s name is way too long. From now on, I’m just going to call it “Xtreme Powder.” Xtreme Powder is beef or buffalo meat that’s been cured, dried, defatterized, and atomized. It’s low in sodium and contains no added nitrites or MSG. For an extreme meat product it’s pretty unremarkable, and nowhere near as fun as Extreme Investing, or Extreme Internet. Instead it’s a kind of pricey jerky powder that levels out on the tasty scale at “meh” and “not very good” on the texture scale. Though, I do like the included clip for extreme clipping and that’s almost worth $.50 alone, but the cap on the tube faces down and just may lead to a gravity assisted meat bailout during your extreme recession bungee jumping session.

Regardless of the extreme belt clip, the whole shredded meat thing is clocking in at $40/lb at retail, so you’d better be getting some extreme add-ons. Each $1.00 tube doesn’t really satisfy my extreme meat cravings like a $15/lbs piece of conventional landjager, but at least it lacks conventional sodium nitrite and comes from extreme cows. It’s not really a net win in my book even with the extreme belt clip. As  I just can’t recommend this rather pricey confection unless you’re looking for an impulse snack by that’s extremely lacking additives and sugar.

Buy some jerky in a tube on Amazon.com!