Jerky Racks are by far one of my favourite stations players can use in Grounded as not only can they be used to provide players with food that never spoils, but they can also be used to help players save resources when trying to dry out when typically that resource would need multiple of the same resource to make.
The one negative side to Jerky Racks is simply how long they take in order to dry everything as players will have to wait 16 real life minutes or 8 in-game hours in order to fully dry an item.
Luckily for players, taking a sleep in Grounded will force all the resources to dry as players will be able to sleep for 8-hours, though will not be able to spam this in hopes of getting resources dried quickly. In my opinion, it’s a good idea to place multiple Jerky Racks in the world so you can utilize your sleep cycle to dry as many items as you can in one go.
For us, we ended up having a minimum of 10 Jerky Racks present at a time, though it is very important to note that players will be able to dry a maximum of 3 items on each Jerky Rack at a time, meaning that for us we were drying at least 30 items at a time.
Note: If you want to watch me play games like Grounded on Twitch head on over here! I’m always happy to answer your questions there as well!
HOW DO YOU MAKE A JERKY RACK?
Jerky Racks require a tougher ingredient to craft being, Bombardier Parts, however, if players farm farm out all the Barbardier Beatles who hang out next to each other they will be able to construct at least one Jerky Rack a day.
The actual ingredients players will need for a Jerky Rack are:
5 Bombardier Parts
6 Crude Ropes
I strongly recommend that players get a Spinning Wheel before they make multiple Jerky Racks as this will significantly help a player craft multiple Crude Ropes with less resources.
HOW DO YOU UNLOCK THE JERKY RACK?
If players are searching for the Jerky Rack and cannot find it then they may not have analyzed the Bombardier Part.
Currently the only way to get the recipe for the Jerky Rack is through analyzing the Bombardier Part.
WHAT RESOURCES CAN YOU MAKE WITH A JERKY RACK?
While players can use their Jerky Rack for making Jerky out of Raw Meats, as mentioned in my Food & Meals post, players can actually use Jerky Racks to help provide them with basic resources which would commonly be crafted with multiples of the resource.
The types of Jerky that are available for players are the following:
Aphid Jerky
Gnat Jerky
Grub Jerky
Tadpole Jerky
Water Flea Jerky
Weevil Jerky
Jerky itself isn’t the most powerful food, only providing players with 20% Hunger versus 50% Hunger when turned into a Roast, however due to the fact that Jerky never expires it becomes one of the best food resources in the game.
If players manage to increase their Consumables stack size high enough using Milk Molars, players can essentially indefinitely hold food on themselves making Hunger a non-thought especially on long adventures.
Admittedly some “Snacks” are more filling than Jerky, however, I would still strongly recommend that players only use the Snacks for Smoothies due to their benefits to a player.
Now, while I do use Jerky Racks for Jerky almost every day, I would say I use it more frequently to dry out resources to obtain more.
Resource management in Grounded can get daunting, especially due to the fact that resources tend to be segregated into a single area on the map. For example, Berries are really annoying to get… so wouldn’t it be nice to be able to obtain Berry Leather without using 3 Berry Chunks? Well you can!
The following are all the resources that players can “Dry” on the Jerky Rack:
1 Plant Fiber for 1 Dry Grass (which isn’t usually useful unless you’re trying to stay in base and making Sconces)
1 Berry Chunk for 1 Berry Leather (when it would usually take 3 Berry Chunks)
1 Pupa Hide for 1 Pupa Leather (when it would normally cost 5 pupa Hide)
DO ANTS STEAL MEAT OFF JERKY RACKS?
Unfortunately, yes. Ants will try to steal Meat off of Jerky Racks as they do on Roasting Spits.
I didn’t realize this at first, as I thought that the Ants that would come into our home were only coming because of our Chests and Roasting Spits, however, Jerky Racks seem to be a large factor in attracting Ants.
If you want to avoid this, I would strongly recommend basing on top of a landmark of some sort or trying to build the Jerky Racks high enough, though the latter is less effective.
Ants infiltrating a base is honestly the most frustrating and annoying thing in Grounded and while you’re able to one or two shot Ants in the mid-to-late game… they’re still really annoying!
CAN YOU REMOVE RESOURCES OFF A JERKY RACK BEFORE IT DRIES?
No, as soon as a player puts a resource on a Drying Rack it is there to stay until the 8 in-game hours pass.
Unfortunately this leaves no room for mistakes, though this shouldn’t be a huge problem for players as in all cases something that is on a Drying Rack will still yield better profits than when it’s not.
CONCLUSION
Out of all structures that a player can build, I’d have to say the Jerky Rack is my favourite.
It really helps with resource management and can make obtaining resources a lot easier.
As Jerky is my main source of food, when I’m too lazy to make a Meal for the day, I am constantly using Jerky Racks.
I do have to say that it is not intuitive that players can dry other resources on the Jerky Rack, leading us to discover which resources we can dry by trial and error. Due to this, there may be some resources missing on the list as different updates will change the way that the Jerky Rack works.
But I’m curious, do you think that the Jerky Rack is OP? What do you mostly use it for? Let me know in the comments below!
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