Biltong is one of the quickest ways into curing and drying meat at home: beef, vinegar, spice and moving air, no experience needed. South Africa dries it as biltong, the United States as jerky — and either way you know inside a week or two, even through the warmer months, whether you got it right.
Biltong — The South African Classic
Salted beef hung in moving air turns up all over Europe — bresaola in Lombardy, cecina in Spain, Bündnerfleisch in the Alps. Every one of them is a cold-cellar tradition: a whole muscle, a long wait, a damp room. Biltong is what the same idea becomes in a hot, dry country. Strips instead of a whole muscle, so the air reaches all of it. Days rather than months. And vinegar carrying part of the load that salt and time carry elsewhere.
The spice is the part people underestimate. Coriander seed is to biltong what juniper is to gin — not a background note but the thing you are actually tasting. Toast it whole in a dry pan until it smells like warm orange peel, crack it in a mortar rather than grinding it to dust, and you get flecks of it in every slice. Ground coriander from a jar will not do the same job; most of what makes it worth having is gone before you open the tin.
Black pepper sits alongside it, and after that every household argues. Some add ginger, some mustard seed, some brown sugar, some nothing at all. What does not change is the shape of the thing: lean beef, cut with the grain, wet with vinegar, heavy with coriander, hung until enough water has left it.
Biltong vs Jerky — What's Actually Different
Biltong and jerky are the same idea, arrived at twice. A warm country, no refrigeration and more beef than you can eat this week — South Africa and the North American frontier both landed on the same answer: lean meat from the round, cut in thick strips with the grain, left in a seasoned marinade, then hung in moving air until enough water has gone.
So the method isn't what separates them. Ours are both cured, both hung on a hook, both air-dried over a week or two. The difference is what's in the marinade.
| Biltong (Mikkel's) | Jerky (Settlers) | |
|---|---|---|
| The liquid | Red wine vinegar and Worcestershire | Soy and Worcestershire |
| The sweet | A little sugar | Brown sugar, and plenty of it |
| The spice | Coriander, black pepper, yellow mustard, ginger, chilli — toasted whole, then crushed | Smoked paprika, garlic, black pepper, chilli |
| Time in the cure | 3 days | 12–24 hours |
| Then | Hung and air-dried over a week or two | Hung and air-dried over a week or two |
The vinegar is the one that does more than flavour
Toasting coriander and mustard seed before you crush them is a flavour decision. The vinegar isn't only that — acid lowers the pH at the surface, which is why a vinegar rinse is worth doing even when you aren't making biltong. In Mikkel's cure the vinegar is in from the start, three days of it, so it's through the whole strip rather than sitting on the outside.
The packet at the petrol station is a different product
Most jerky sold in a packet is cooked — thin strips driven dry with heat in a few hours, with sugar and smoke flavour doing most of the work. That's where people get the idea that jerky and biltong are opposites. It isn't what jerky has to be. Cured properly and hung, it's closer to biltong than it is to the packet, because the method is the same one: salt, air, time, and something to tell you when the water has actually gone.
Droëwors, the one nobody outside South Africa orders
South Africa's other dried meat is droëwors — the same spices, but the meat is ground, pushed into a thin casing and hung until it snaps. Same cure, same air, different shape. There's no droëwors recipe in the app yet; if you already make sausage, it's the shortest way in.
Which to make first? Biltong. Three days in the cure and a week or two on the hook — about two weeks all in, and you know whether the spot you picked in the house actually works.
Mikkel's Recipe
Mikkel Borre is a Danish cook, butcher and sausage maker, trained in restaurant kitchens and in old-school butcher shops — including a century-old one on the island of Funen. His version brings the South African classic closer to a European palate: red wine vinegar in place of malt, Worcestershire sauce for depth, and ginger and yellow mustard seed alongside the coriander.
He makes it in an apartment in Copenhagen, which is the point — you do not need a cellar.
Ingredients:
- 1 kg (2.2 lb) lean beef from the round — top round, bottom round, silverside or topside
- 2 tbsp (30 g) red wine vinegar
- 1 tbsp (20 g) Worcestershire sauce
- 1 tbsp (20 g) sea salt or coarse salt
- 1 tbsp (15 g) sugar
- 2.5 tbsp (16 g) coriander seeds
- 1 tbsp (8 g) black peppercorns
- 2 tsp (5 g) ginger powder
- 0.5 tsp (2 g) yellow mustard seeds
- 0.5 tsp (1 g) chili flakes
Instructions:
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Trim the beef of unwanted sinew. Leave some fat — it matters for flavour. Cut with the grain into strips about 2–3 cm (1 inch) thick, the full length of the cut.
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Toast the coriander seeds, black peppercorns, mustard seeds and chili flakes in a dry pan until fragrant, then crush them roughly in a mortar. Do not grind them to powder.
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Mix the crushed spices with the remaining dry ingredients, add the red wine vinegar and Worcestershire sauce, and stir until the salt and sugar have dissolved.
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Coat the beef in the marinade, cover it, and leave it to cure in the refrigerator for 3 days — turn the meat after 24 hours so it cures evenly.
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Wipe each piece dry with paper towel. You want the surface moisture gone, not the spice crust.
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Make a hole in the thickest end of each strip and tie a loop with butcher's twine. Hang the meat on your Meatdryer hook somewhere dark and well ventilated — a basement or a shed — at 20–25°C (68–77°F) with 50–60% humidity. Keep the pieces from touching.
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Drying takes 7–14 days. Aim for 50% weight loss; your Meatdryer will tell you when it is there. You can taste one after a few days by squeezing the sides and cutting a piece off.
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Slice thinly against the grain and serve.
The full recipe is in the Meatdryer app. To see Mikkel make it, step by step — Instagram - Biltong with Meatdryer
Hygiene and mold
Always wear gloves and maintain strict hygiene when handling and hanging meat. Use a protective net to keep flies and insects away. Hang the meat in a well-ventilated area.
Some types of white mold can be completely normal and harmless, especially in slightly more humid environments. They can often be removed by gently scraping them off or wiping with vinegar.
Other types of mold, such as green or black mold, can be harmful, and in those cases the meat should not be eaten. Please read more about mold if you are unsure.
All cooking and meat handling is always done at your own risk.
Shop the Recipe
Everything you need to make Biltong at home — just like Mikkel.
- Meatdryer Hook — Hang and dry your meat anywhere, from a basement to a city apartment.
- Butcher Twine for Hanging Meat — Tie your strips securely before hanging.
- Protective Net for Drying Meat — Keeps flies and insects off while the strips dry.
- Accessory Hook for Hanging Meat — Expand your setup to hang heavier pieces.
