Messin' With Sasquatch Is Back!

Photo from Link Snacks Inc.

Remember those Messin' With Sasquatch Jack Link Beef Jerky commercials from a couple of years ago?  Well, they're back with a series of all-new ads which are now available for viewing on YouTube and will soon be in the ad rotation on several cable networks including Comedy Central, TBS, National Geographic, and ESPN.  They'll have "broadcast versions" as well as online-only "alternative ending versions" featuring more puerile  (read:  even funnier to my inner 12-year-old) humor.

Links:

Sasquatch's YouTube Channel

Press Release Detailing The New Ad Spots

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Perky Jerky

So, a couple weeks ago the family and I were moseying through the local Price Chopper, and Lynnafred stops short at one of the endcap displays to gaze at some shiny mylar-packaged meat product:  Perky Jerky.  "Whoa," she said, "Caffienated beef jerky.  How bitchin' is that??"  I agreed it was pretty bitchin', and into the shopping cart it went.

Fast forward a couple of weeks, and I'm rummaging around in the kitchen, looking for a quick snack after work, so I opened the breadbox to see what kinds of beef jerky might be on hand, and LO!  Perky Jerky is there awaiting me!  Lynnafred and I both had a couple of pieces.

First off, it's real sliced beef and not that chopped-and-formed crap that seems to be taking over the market lately.  And you know what?  Perky Jerky had damned well better be sliced beef for the price you pay.  $4.99 for two ounces.  Damn.  That same $4.99 will get you four ounces of most other jerkies, so this is some expensive stuff.

The flavor, I must admit, is decent.  Moist (Lynn said "sticky") and reasonably tender, it's got the usual jerky saltiness and a bit of a peppery profile as well, though not too spicy.  And don't buy it for the guarana "flavor," either, because you rally can't taste it (no surprise there, there's more soy sauce, brown sugar, and lemon juice in the stuff than there is guarana.  And there sure as hell isn't that much caffeination, either.  You know how most caffeinated stuff which is sold as a "pick-me-up" almost brags on the label about how much caffeine you're getting?  Perky Jerky doesn't.  In fact, they don't disclose the caffeine level anywhere - not on the package, not on their website.  They can quack all they want about coffee being "so 2009," but a package of Perky Jerky isn't going to do the job of a good old fashioned cup of joe or can of Monster.

My personal opinion is that Perky Jerky is a decent quality beef jerky, cleverly marketed in order to be priced at double the going rate for all other decent quality beef jerky brands.

By the way...we really do keep beef jerky (and various other snacks) in the breadbox.  And before you ask, we keep the bread on the countertop.

Links:

The Perky Jerky website.

Another review of Perky Jerky by my fellow blogger Mr. Dave over at The Ridiculous Food Society of Upstate New York.  Yet another instance of synchronicity between his blog and mine.  Someday I'm going to hunt him down and buy him a beer or three.

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Pemmican Beef Jerky - Marinades

Ever since I was a kid, Pemmican has been like the Filet Mignon of beef jerky. Wicked high quality, nicely-defined slices of beef with a minimum of crumbs and annoying shreds in the bottom of the bag, and decent flavors that weren't overly high in salt.

Recently, Jack Link's has been giving Pemmican a run for their money - especially with some of the very cool new varieties coming out - but still, Pemmican endures, and even brings in a few surprises now and again. Like their "Marinades" line of jerky flavors. I bought a couple bags of the Marinades recently and decided to see how they stacked up against each other. We tried "Steak Fajita" and "Steakhouse Style." I enjoyed both of them, but each for very different reasons.

Steak Fajita - The first thing that impressed me about this variety was the smell. As soon as I tore the pouch open, I was hit by the most delicious aroma of searing beef, roasting green bell peppers and caramelizing onions. It was amazing - like someone had placed a sizzling platter of fajita beef down in front of me. The taste, unfortunately, was not as intense as the aroma - alas! - but still, the pepper, onion, and "grill" flavors were all there to a degree, making this jerky one of the best and most interesting ones I've tried in quite awhile. Top notch all the way.

Steakhouse Style - When I was nine or ten years old, my parents would sometimes take us out to eat at Ponderosa, the big steakhouse chain that has since pretty much disappeared from New England. There was some kind of cheap-meal deal there so they could feed four kids fairly inexpensively. The steaks were thin, and kind of USDA-Not-Choice, and they had that softish texture that chemical tenderization gives beef. And also, they had a "flavor enhancement" that my nine-year-old self sort of liked despite being mildly suspicious of it. I hadn't thought about Ponderosa or their "marinated" steak in years, and they were still far from my mental radar when I bought the Pemmican Steakhouse Syle variety. Only after opening the bag did all those memories of Thursday night out at the Ponderosa Steakhouse find their way back. The smell of the jerky was so familiar...it was...damn, the memory was so close, but so fleeting, and I just couldn't pin it down, until I put a piece into my mouth and suddenly it all came back to me, and I was nine years old again eating a 3/8-inch-thick marinated sheet of beef. I should bring some over to my sister's house. We can reminisce about the flavor and I can flick peas into her hair again, just like when we were kids.

Jack Link Sweet & Spicy Thai Beef Jerky

Jack Link's beef jerky is always of excellent quality, and their new Sweet & Spicy Thai flavor is no exception: the beef is always top-notch, sliced uniformly, and flavored evenly. It's flavored with soy sauce and hot pepper - the pepper variety isn't specified, but it tastes to me more like standard cayenne than Thai birdseye pepper - and I guess this combination of heat and soy is what inspired the name.

There's a strange smell when the bag is opened; I likened it to chlorine bleach, my daughter thought it was "detergenty," and my wife simply sniffed the air suspiciously and asked, "Eww. Is that the dog?" Nevertheless, there was also the rich and beefy smell of jerky so we tried a bite or two despite the interesting aroma.

The first taste is sweet, followed by the warm pepper sensation, which was quite mild but cumulative. Only after a couple of pieces did the spice really come forward, and even then it wasn't unbearable. I'd peg it at the low end of medium. The heat was persistent, though, and carried the sensation down the hatch, giving a "deep warmth" that reminded me of taking a shot of whiskey.

Overall, a worthy jerky especially for those looking for a bit of a kick, but a few points off for the smell.

Link (no pun intended):

Jack Link's website

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Mr. Z Beef Jerky

A month or so ago, Snackgirl over at Second Rate Snacks did a head-to-head comparison of Mr. Z to Jack Link (click here to check it out.) Her review was generally favorable, so I started to keep half an eye out for Mr. Z.

As it happens, I soon found a couple packages of Mr. Z Peppered beef jerky at one of the local job-lot places. It was a good price, and it turned out to be pretty decent jerky - real slices of real beef, and not any of that chopped and formed stuff that looks like it's been put in a blender and poured out to dry like some kind of barbecue-flavored Fruit Roll-Ups.

And then over the weekend, I hit the jackpot over at Dollar Tree: the full line of Mr. Z jerky, in full-sized four-ounce packages, for just a dollar each!

My first impression of Mr. Z was borne out as I tried the other flavors. Very high-quality beef jerky. The pieces were cut a little small, but they were still real slices of meat and not some bastardized puree. The label touts that the jerky is made from "grass-fed beef" which is probably meant to imply "free range" without actually saying so, but realistically, you'll never be able to tell the difference after all the processing is done and the spices and flavorings are added.

So, how is this stuff? Here's the run-down:

• Original Flavor is pretty standard beef jerky. Snackgirl noted that there wasn't much difference between this and Jack Link, and she was right, but it also wasn't all that much different from Oberto or Jeff Foxworthy's, either.

• Peppered is excellent. Very pronounced beefyness, loaded with delicious fruity-smelling fresh cracked pepper. Lots of black-pepper heat and a subtle sweetness behind it all. This is so much better than cheaper "peppered" jerkies I've had.

• Teriyaki - Another winning flavor; delicious soy and ginger flavors shine through.

• Sweet and Hot - Quite interesting. This flavor seemed to be lightly glazed with brown sugar and it had a very subtle cayenne-style pepper heat behind it. The sweet predominates at first, with the hot barely noticeable, but after eating more than one or two pieces, the heat begins to build and balance out the taste. Diehard chiliheads won't find this anything to scream about, and neither will pepper wusses (at first.) It's the cumulative effect that gets ya.

If you like jerky and you've a Dollar Tree nearby, get over there and check it out. But do it quick - the stuff is selling fast!

Jeff Foxworthy Beef Jerky

Pros:

• Seems to be made with real meat, not ground up unrecognizable protein bits.
• No strange ingredients - there's nothing in this beef jerky that I wouldn't put into making my own.
• Bitchen pepper flavor provided by generous amounts of freshly cracked peppercorns. When you open the bag, the aroma is incredible: meat and the rich fruity smell of cracked pepper. I liked it better than Oberto.
  
• Great price. (Got it at Big Lots!)

Cons:

• Jeff Foxworthy's face grinning at me from the package.

Link:
Monogram Food Solutions - Manufacturer of Jeff Foxworthy Jerky
How Jeff Foxworthy got involved in the Jerky Business. Probably not written by Jeff Foxworthy.

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Jack Link's A1 Jerky

I kind of like A1 steak sauce - not as much as I used to, before Kraft bought the brand and bulldozed the flavor with their filthy high-fructose corn syrup, but enough that I still keep a bottle around for the occasional lousy cut of meat that needs a flavor kick. So when I saw that Jack Link had introduced a beef jerky variety flavored with A1, I knew I had to try it.

Guess what? It's good! As you'd expect from Jack Link, the beef is top-notch: real sliced beef, no chopped-and-formed garbage like some of the bargain-basement crap. Mostly bite-sized pieces with a sprinkling of larger and smaller chunks and only a little bit of crumbles in the bottom of the bag.

It was the flavor that really took me by surprise. The A1 is used sparingly, allowing the taste of the beef to come through, accented by the flavor notes of the steak sauce. The effect is very much like teriyaki - in fact, if you're a fan of teriyaki-flavor jerky, you'll probably enjoy the A1 flavor.

Links:

Jack Link Website
Jack Link's Messin' With Sasquatch commercials.

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