Heads up beef jerky, goose dry meat is coming

Do you like jerky? 

You know — the spicy, flavourful, packaged stuff you find on counters at corner stores, or in the checkout aisles in grocery stores.

Beef jerky is king.

But beyond the packaging and never-ending flavours of beef jerky found in stores, there's a trend happening: the homemade stuff. 

Jerky is often dried on oven racks or in dehydrators, whereas dry meat is usually hung to dry. In the end, the delicious results are similar; both are dried and can be stored for long periods of time without refrigeration.

Dry meat is just as good as the store bought stuff — some say even better — especially when beef is taken out of the equation and wild meat is used.

From alligator to bison, moose to deer, the options are almost unlimited when it comes to drying big game meat.

But have you ever heard of goose dry meat? 

"I never knew you could make dry meat with goose meat. It was very tasty," said Tanya Clark who grew up in Yellowknife but now lives in Grande Prairie, Alta.

She was first introduced to it a few years ago and she's been experimenting with it ever since.

"When making goose dry meat … you need to slice it really thin," Clark said in an interview with CBC Northwind host Wanda McLeod.

It's very rich.- Tanya Clark

Clark is a member of CBC North's Facebook recipe group The Arctic Kitchen, and when she made goose dry meat this fall, she knew she had to share it.

"It turned out so good."

And making it was simple once she had the perfectly thin slices.

"I just added my spices to it and hung it on my rack above my stove and let it dry and kept flipping it and pounding it halfway through."

The results were as expected.

"My husband and kids just go to town on it. I prefer eating mine with unsalted butter or avocado ... Kids like to eat it with lard," said Clark. 

She said the texture is similar to caribou dry meat, but the taste is very different.

"It's very rich," she said. "Which is why I prefer to slice them thin rather than thick."

And when it comes to spices, she says she just uses what's in her cupboards. 

"I use some seasoning salt on one. I used ginger, brown sugar and soya sauce... garlic, Montreal steak spice. Just whatever I have on hand."  

This year, Clark expects that she will be making a lot of goose dry meat. 

"My friend called me up and he was like, 'do you want some goose meat,' and I was like, 'Sure I'd love some goose meat,'" she said.

"I thought he was just going to give me one or two and he ended up putting in nine large Ziplock bags. He just kept loading up my SUV."

No doubt, that friend will be getting his fair share of her delicious, rich, spicy and thinly sliced goose dry meat — unlike anything he'd ever find in a store.