Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Green Light Beef Jerky

Green Light Beef JerkyGreen Light Jerky Company, based in Redwood City, CA, is a new entry into the world of beef jerky. If you're a fan of thin-sliced jerky, you'll want to take note.

For this review, I'm reviewing three of their flavors, "The Classic", "Pepper Grinder", and "PRD" (Prime Rib Dinner).

All three of the varieties reviewed here are flavored with soy sauce, onions, vinegar, salt, apple cider, and honey.

The pieces are thinly-sliced into strips of about half-inch to an inch wide, and about three to six inches in length. The texture is more drier than moist, but are still soft enough to bite off chunks easily.

The strips appear to be cuts of real meat.

Green Light says they use no MSG, no nitrates, no liquid smoke, no added sugar, and no thickening agents.

The Classic

The Classic flavor has a mild soy sauce flavor and smell, not very salty, with a very subtle spicy tingle in the back of your throat. That spiciness comes from the guajillo and pasilla chile spices that they sprinkle on.

The beef flavor is still very evident, and there's a slight taste of beef fat.

Pepper Grinder

Pepper Grinder is the same as The Classic, but with ground pepper corns sprinkled on. There's a pretty good amount of pepper there, but not overdone like on some other brands.

It has a very peppery flavor that balances out the soy sauce, and as to be expected, has a medium-degree of spiciness.

PRD (Prime Rib Dinner)

There was a clear scent of thyme when I opened the package of PRD and took a whiff. That's because it's flavored with thyme and horseradish, to emulate eating a cut of prime rib.

And you can definitely taste the thyme and see the pieces of thyme seasoning also.

As for the horseradish, I don't really taste much of it, probably because the thyme seems to overpower it. You figure with horseradish, this variety of jerky will be spicy, but it's not. It's quite mild.

Product Value

Green Light's jerky offerings are priced on the high side, at $10.00 for a 4oz bag, or $5.00 for a 2oz bag. That works out to $2.50 per ounce. Compare that to the $1.00-$1.50 per ounce ballpark for the garden-variety brands out there. But then again, you're getting a higher quality product here.



My Thoughts

If you consider yourself a beef-jerky afficionado, you'll appreciate the quality and taste of Green Light as I have. The high price-point takes this brand out of the realm of general purpose snacking, but for those times when I want to sit in my back patio and listen to the birds, a 2oz bag of Green Light makes a great companion.

I gave this a 4-star "Good" rating, instead of a 5-star "Best" simply because my preference is for thicker cut, and slightly more moist pieces of jerky. But for those of you who love thin sliced jerky, or dry jerky, then this could be a 5-star jerky here at Best Beef Jerky.

I still enjoyed sampling these varieties for this review. The "Classic" variety is quite tastier than the regular flavors of other brands.

Rating: Good



Buy This Online: http://www.greenlightjerky.com

2 comments:

  1. I love Green Light Jerky... I first found out about them as they sponsor the Fitz & Brooks Photo Contest on KNBR.com. http://www.knbr.com/fitzBrooks/gallery.html

    The PRD flavor is the bomb... can't wait for Mojo...

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  2. Just tried a bag of the "Pepper Grinder" and it was terrible. Texture was like a crumbling piece of cardboard, and the taste wasn't meaty at all. Sincerely disappointed given the steep price as I was expecting some top cut beef that keeps you salivating for more. After a few pieces, I'm ready to give this to my dog. On a positive note, the peppercorns did seem fresh but this jerky lacks flavor and the texture shouldn't be called "jerky".

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