Learning how to make traditional biltong means learning a technique that's been passed down through South African families for generations, long before refrigeration or modern food science existed. Unlike beef jerky, which relies on heat to dry and preserve meat, traditional biltong uses a combination of salt, vinegar, and ambient air to create a tender, deeply flavored snack that's shelf-stable without cooking or refrigeration.
This guide is written for complete beginners — if you've never made cured meat before, you'll find everything you need here: what equipment to gather, what ingredients to buy, and a full walkthrough from raw meat to finished biltong. If you're already familiar with curing and want a tighter, recipe-focused version of just the curing stage, our companion post on how to cure biltong covers that specific stage in a more condensed format. This guide goes further, covering the entire journey including equipment setup and troubleshooting for first-timers.
Understanding What Makes Biltong "Traditional"
Before covering how to make traditional biltong, it's worth understanding what separates "traditional" from shortcuts you might see online. Traditional biltong relies on exactly four elements: a proper salt cure, a vinegar soak, a coriander-and-pepper spice coating, and slow air-drying at ambient temperature — no ovens, no dehydrators set to warm settings, no liquid smoke.
This method traces back to Dutch settlers and indigenous communities in southern Africa, who needed a way to preserve meat for weeks or months without refrigeration. The technique that emerged — salt and acid for preservation, air for final moisture removal — worked so well that it's remained essentially unchanged for centuries. Modern producers like Howdysnax still use this same traditional method today, scaled up within a USDA-inspected facility but never substituting heat or chemical preservatives for the real process.
Equipment You'll Need
Learning how to make traditional biltong at home starts with gathering the right tools. You don't need anything expensive or specialized:
For cutting and curing:
- A sharp, sturdy knife
- A cutting board
- A large, non-reactive bowl or container (glass or stainless steel — avoid aluminum, which can react with vinegar)
- A refrigerator for the salting stage
For drying:
- Meat hooks, S-hooks, or clean butcher's string
- A ventilated drying space — this is the piece most beginners need to build or improvise. Options include:
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A cardboard or wooden box with mesh or cheesecloth-covered sides and a small fan clipped to one side for airflow
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A dedicated pantry shelf or closet with a small fan running continuously
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A garage or covered outdoor space with good airflow and protection from direct sun and pests (screened to keep insects out)
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Optional but helpful:
- A hygrometer to monitor humidity (aim for 50–70%)
- A thermometer to confirm ambient temperature stays around 65–72°F
Ingredients for Traditional Biltong
For approximately 2–3 lbs of beef:
- 2–3 lbs lean beef (topside, silverside, or rump)
- 2–3 tablespoons coarse salt per pound of meat
- 2 cups malt vinegar or brown grape vinegar (enough to fully submerge the strips)
- 3–4 tablespoons whole coriander seed, toasted and cracked
- 1–2 tablespoons whole black peppercorns, cracked
- Optional: a pinch of brown sugar, chili flakes, or ground cloves for flavor variation
Step-by-Step: How to Make Traditional Biltong
Step 1: Choose and Prepare the Meat
Select a lean cut — topside, silverside, or rump are the traditional choices, since they have manageable fat content and a grain structure suited to slicing into long strips. Trim any excess visible fat, since fat doesn't cure or dry well and can turn rancid over the multi-day drying period.
Step 2: Cut With the Grain
Slice the meat into strips ½ to 1 inch thick, cutting along the direction of the muscle fibers rather than across them. This single detail has an outsized impact on the final texture — cutting against the grain produces a stringy, unevenly dried result no matter how well you execute the remaining steps. Longer strips (6–10 inches) are traditional and make hanging easier.
Step 3: Apply the Salt Cure
Rub coarse salt generously over every surface of each strip — roughly 2–3 tablespoons per pound. Place the salted meat in the refrigerator for 45 minutes to an hour. This draws moisture out through osmosis, beginning the preservation process well before the meat ever reaches the drying stage.
Step 4: Rinse and Soak in Vinegar
Rinse the salt off under cold water and pat the strips dry. Submerge them fully in vinegar for 30 to 60 minutes. This step lowers the surface pH of the meat, adding a second layer of protection against bacterial growth, while also creating the tangy flavor biltong is known for. This isn't an optional flavor step — it's functional to the preservation chemistry, so don't skip it to save time.
Step 5: Toast and Apply the Spice Coating
Toast whole coriander seed in a dry pan for 1–2 minutes until fragrant, then crack it coarsely using a mortar and pestle or the flat side of a knife blade. Mix with cracked black pepper and any optional additions. Remove the strips from the vinegar, pat dry, and press the spice mixture firmly into every surface. This coating stays on through the entire drying period, forming the visible crust associated with properly made biltong.
Step 6: Hang and Air-Dry
Hang each strip individually in your prepared drying space, ensuring strips don't touch each other (this restricts airflow around each piece). Maintain steady ventilation, moderate humidity (50–70%), and cool ambient temperature (65–72°F). Check daily. Depending on strip thickness and your preferred texture, this stage takes 3 to 7 days — shorter for a softer "wet" biltong, longer for a firmer traditional texture.
For a deeper look at exactly why this stage relies on air rather than heat, and what's happening at a molecular level during those days, see our post on why biltong is air dried.
Step 7: Check for Doneness
Your biltong is ready when it has a deep reddish-brown color, a firm-but-pliable texture (not brittle), and has lost roughly 30–50% of its original weight through moisture evaporation. Slice a small piece to check the interior texture before committing to a full batch.
Step 8: Store Properly
Once finished, store your biltong in an airtight container. It can typically sit at room temperature for a couple of weeks, though refrigeration extends freshness significantly, especially in humid climates.
Troubleshooting Your First Batch
Even with careful attention, first attempts at how to make traditional biltong don't always go perfectly. Here's what to watch for:
Uneven drying: Usually caused by inconsistent strip thickness or strips touching each other during hanging, which restricts airflow to those contact points.
Mold growth: Most often the result of inadequate airflow or humidity that's too high. A light, harmless white bloom is sometimes normal on traditionally cured meats, but any fuzzy green, black, or colored mold means the affected piece should be discarded.
Overly salty result: Usually from using fine table salt instead of coarse salt (fine salt penetrates faster and less evenly), or from not rinsing thoroughly enough after the salting stage.
Tough or stringy texture: Almost always traced back to cutting against the grain rather than with it — a mistake that can't be corrected once strips are cut.
Biltong dried too fast on the outside, still soft inside ("case hardening"): Usually caused by air that's too dry or too warm. Adjust your drying space toward the cooler, more humid end of the recommended ranges.
Why the Traditional Method Still Matters
Some modern shortcuts exist — using a food dehydrator on a low setting, for example, to speed up drying. But doing so changes the fundamental chemistry of the product. Heat above roughly 140°F begins denaturing the meat's proteins, which is exactly the textural change that separates biltong from beef jerky. If your goal is genuinely learning how to make traditional biltong — not a heat-dried approximation of it — sticking with ambient air, however much longer it takes, is non-negotiable.
This is also why authenticity matters when buying biltong rather than making it yourself. Every batch of Howdysnax biltong follows this same traditional sequence at commercial scale, within a USDA-inspected facility, without substituting heat or shortcuts for the real method.
Regional and Family Variations Worth Knowing
While the core method for how to make traditional biltong stays consistent, small variations exist across South African households and regions:
Spice blends: Some families add a touch of brown sugar to balance the vinegar's acidity, while others keep the profile strictly savory. Chili-forward variations exist too — our Chili Bites build on the traditional coriander-pepper base with added heat.
Wet vs. dry preference: This comes down to drying duration rather than the curing method itself — a shorter drying period (3–4 days) produces a softer, chewier biltong, while a longer period (5–7+ days) produces the firmer, more traditional texture most associated with classic biltong.
Cut variations: While topside, silverside, and rump are most common, some traditional recipes use whole slabs rather than pre-cut strips, allowing the eater to slice their own portions — a style you can find in our Beef Slab Biltong.
From Homemade to Howdysnax: Comparing Your Batch
Once you've made your own batch, it's genuinely useful to compare it against a professionally produced reference point. Taste-testing your homemade biltong side-by-side with Howdysnax's traditional biltong can help you calibrate what "properly cured and dried" should actually taste and feel like — commercial producers benefit from consistent environmental controls that home setups can't always replicate exactly, so small differences in texture or saltiness between batches are completely normal as you refine your technique.
Frequently Asked Questions About How to Make Traditional Biltong
1. How long does it take to make traditional biltong from start to finish?
The active preparation stages (cutting, salting, and vinegar soaking) take about 2 hours combined. The full process, including the air-drying period, takes an additional 3 to 7 days depending on strip thickness and your desired final texture — softer biltong finishes closer to 3–4 days, while firmer, traditional-style biltong takes closer to 5–7 days.
2. What is the best meat to use for traditional biltong?
Lean cuts like topside, silverside, or rump are the traditional choices, since they have manageable fat content and a muscle grain structure that slices well into long strips. Fattier cuts don't cure or dry as evenly and can turn rancid during the multi-day drying period.
3. Do you need special equipment to make biltong at home?
No specialized equipment is strictly required. A sharp knife, a non-reactive container for the vinegar soak, and a well-ventilated space for hanging (often a simple mesh-sided box with a small fan) are sufficient for most home setups. A hygrometer and thermometer are helpful but optional additions for monitoring humidity and temperature more precisely.
4. Why is my homemade biltong tough instead of tender?
Toughness almost always comes from cutting the meat against the grain rather than with it. Traditional biltong is sliced along the direction of the muscle fibers specifically to preserve tenderness during the drying process — cutting the other way shortens the fibers and produces a stringier, tougher bite regardless of how well the curing steps are executed.
5. Can you speed up the traditional biltong-making process?
You can slightly speed up drying by increasing airflow, but introducing heat (such as a warm dehydrator setting) to accelerate the process fundamentally changes the product. Heat causes protein denaturation, which alters both texture and flavor — at that point, you've made a form of jerky rather than traditional biltong. The multi-day timeline is a necessary feature of the method, not something to work around.
6. Is homemade biltong safe to eat without refrigeration?
Properly cured and dried biltong is shelf-stable due to reduced water activity and lowered pH from the salt and vinegar stages, which together create conditions inhospitable to most spoilage bacteria. However, home curers should still monitor for any signs of spoilage (sour smell, sliminess, unusual colored mold) throughout the process and store finished biltong in a cool, dry, airtight container, refrigerating if your climate is particularly humid.
Learning how to make traditional biltong at home is genuinely rewarding — not because it's complicated, but because it connects you to a centuries-old technique that solved a real problem long before refrigeration existed. Every stage, from cutting with the grain to the patient days of air-drying, exists for a specific reason rooted in food science, not tradition for its own sake.
Your first batch might not be perfect, and that's completely normal — most home curers refine their timing and technique over a few attempts. In the meantime, exploring Howdysnax's full biltong and droëwors collection gives you a reliable benchmark for what the traditional method should taste like when executed at scale, made using the exact same salt-vinegar-spice-air sequence described in this guide.