Carne Seca substitute

Best substitute

Beef Chuck plus Salt Pork or Slab Bacon

For 1 lb carne seca use ¾ lb beef chuck plus 4 oz salt pork, rinsed

Best for feijoada

Different taste

The best reconstruction is fresh beef chuck plus salt pork or slab bacon, roughly three parts chuck to one part salt pork, which gives you the beefy chew from one and the cured salt and fat from the other. Uncooked corned beef brisket, rinsed well, is the closest single-ingredient swap. Plain unsweetened beef jerky works if you can find any that is genuinely plain. What carne seca is doing in a pot of feijoada is salting and deepening the whole dish as much as adding meat, so whatever you use, taste the liquid before you add any more salt.

Other carne seca substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Uncooked Corned Beef Brisket (rinsed)
Different taste
Use the same amount by weight
Raw brisket straight out of the curing brine, rinsed thoroughly and simmered until tender, then cubed or shredded.
What changes
Best for
feijoada, escondidinho de carne seca, shredded fillings, bean pots
Closest single ingredient you can buy in a normal supermarket, because it is salt-cured beef that shreds into the same coarse fibres. Two things to manage: it is far wetter than dried beef so it will not thicken the pot the same way, and the pickling spice in the brine brings coriander, clove and bay that reads faintly Irish. Rinse hard, discard the spice packet, and skip the first simmering water.
3Plain Unsweetened Beef Jerky
Different taste
Use 8 oz jerky for every 1 lb carne seca
Dried salted beef, which is broadly the same idea in a smaller format.
What changes
Soak in hot water for 30 minutes, then simmer with the dish.
Best for
feijoada, small batches, when nothing else is available
Only works if the jerky is genuinely plain, and most supermarket jerky is not. Teriyaki, honey, black pepper and smoky barbecue coatings will all make a pot of beans taste sweet and sauce-like, which is hard to fix. Use half the weight since jerky is much drier, and check the label for sugar first. Look for carne seca or machaca in Mexican shops, which is closer.
4Pastrami Ends or Smoked Brisket
Different taste
Use ¾ lb for every 1 lb carne seca
Cured, smoked beef with the right salt level and the right coarse shreddable grain.
What changes
Best for
feijoada, escondidinho, quick versions, shredded fillings
Texture and salt are close, and it shreds beautifully. The problem is smoke, which is not part of charque's flavour and dominates everything it touches, so a feijoada made with it tastes like American barbecue in a bean pot. That is genuinely good eating, just not Brazilian. Use less than the recipe says and add no other smoked meat.
5Prosciutto Ends or Cured Ham Scraps
Taste and texture differ
Use 4 oz for every 1 lb carne seca, alongside fresh beef
The offcuts and ends butchers sell cheaply, which carry a lot of concentrated cured savour.
What changes
Best for
bean pots, adding depth, supporting fresh beef
Excellent at supplying the aged, salty, faintly nutty background that dried beef gives a pot, and useless as a texture replacement, because cured ham falls apart into soft threads rather than holding a fibrous chew. Use it as a partner to fresh beef, not as the substitute on its own.
6Fresh Beef Chuck plus Extra Salt
Different taste
Use 1 lb chuck for every 1 lb carne seca, plus about 1 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon fish sauce
The honest fallback when nothing cured is available.
What changes
Cube, brown hard, salt generously and simmer long.
Best for
feijoada, weeknight bean stews, when the shops have nothing
This is the least-bad option and it is worth saying plainly what it gives you: tender, well-seasoned beef in a good pot of beans, without the deep concentrated dried-meat savour that is the whole reason charque is in the recipe. A teaspoon of fish sauce, a dried mushroom or a piece of parmesan rind narrows the gap noticeably. Nobody will be disappointed; nobody will mistake it for the real thing.

What is Carne Seca?

Carne Seca is beef that has been heavily salted and air-dried into firm, salt-crusted slabs, sold in Latin American markets as charque or jerked beef, and it has to be soaked and simmered before it can be cooked with.

Cooking tips

Soaking is not optional. Rinse the slab under cold water, then soak it in cold water in the fridge for 12 to 24 hours, changing the water three or four times. Charque is preserved with enough salt to make an unsoaked pot of beans genuinely inedible.
After soaking, boil the meat in fresh water for 10 to 15 minutes and throw that water away too, then cook it with the dish. That second discard is where the last of the harsh salt goes.
Taste the cooking liquid before you salt anything else. Carne seca usually seasons the entire pot on its own, and this is the single most common way a first feijoada goes wrong.
Buy the fattier slabs. Lean charque stays stringy and dry no matter how long you simmer it, while a piece with visible fat turns silky and enriches the broth.
Shred it warm, straight out of the simmer, with two forks. It stiffens as it cools and becomes much harder to pull apart.
For escondidinho, fry the shredded meat in a little butter or oil with onion and garlic before it goes under the cassava puree. That browning step is where most of the flavour of the finished dish comes from.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between carne seca, charque and carne de sol?

All three are salted dried beef, and the difference is how hard. Carne de sol is lightly salted and dried only briefly, often overnight, so it stays soft and mild and needs a short soak of an hour or two. Charque, usually what English recipes mean by carne seca or jerked beef, is heavily salted and dried much longer, so it is firm, deeply savoury and needs 12 to 24 hours of soaking. Mexican carne seca, or machaca, is a drier, more lightly salted shredded product and is not interchangeable in a Brazilian recipe.

Can I use beef jerky instead of carne seca?

Only if it is plain. The concept is right, since both are salted dried beef, and soaking jerky in hot water for half an hour before simmering does bring it back toward slab dried beef. The catch is that nearly all supermarket jerky is coated in sugar, soy, teriyaki glaze or liquid smoke, all of which will take over a pot of beans and cannot be rinsed out. Read the ingredient list, and use about half the weight since jerky is much drier.

Can I leave carne seca out of feijoada?

You can, and the beans will still be good, but you are removing two things at once: a large part of the salt that seasons the pot, and the concentrated aged beefiness that makes feijoada taste different from any other pork and bean stew. If you skip it, salt the pot deliberately rather than by habit, and add another cured element such as smoked ham hock or salt pork to keep some depth. A feijoada made only with fresh meat tastes noticeably flatter.

How long do I need to soak carne seca?

For proper charque or jerked beef, 12 to 24 hours in cold water in the fridge, with the water changed three or four times. For carne de sol, one to three hours is usually enough. The way to check is to cut off a small piece after soaking, boil it for a couple of minutes and taste it: it should read as well-seasoned beef rather than as salt. If it is still harsh, keep soaking, because you cannot fix it later.

Can I make carne seca at home?

Salting and air-drying meat safely depends on getting the salt concentration, temperature and humidity right, and those numbers are what keep it safe rather than merely dry. Follow a tested recipe from a reliable source such as your national food-safety extension service rather than improvising or reducing the salt, and do not adapt a curing recipe to taste. If you want the flavour without the project, the salt pork and chuck combination above gets you most of the way in an afternoon.

Related substitutes

More meat & protein substitutes

Carne Seca substitute

Other carne seca substitutes

2Uncooked Corned Beef Brisket (rinsed)

3Plain Unsweetened Beef Jerky

4Pastrami Ends or Smoked Brisket

5Prosciutto Ends or Cured Ham Scraps

6Fresh Beef Chuck plus Extra Salt