Our Story

Desert Blend is a family-owned business located in the Austin, Texas area. The business was developed from a curiosity about jerky and a hobby that grew to tremendous proportions.

In the mid 1990's, after expressing an interest in trying to make beef jerky at home, Bruce Johnson was given a home jerky-making kit by his wife. It was a basic kit that included spices, a metal form or press, and instructions to make jerky from ground beef. While the initial batches yielded mostly inedible greasy "meat sticks" hardly worthy of being called jerky (especially by a Texan), it inspired Bruce to try to fix what was wrong with the recipe and the texture.

He started to experiment with different types of spices and then with different cuts of real beef from the grocery store. After several months of experimentation, the trademark flavor that is the base of all the Desert Blend products began to be established. Over time, his friends began to request more and more until the oven was working hard nearly all day with batches of jerky. Word spread and orders started flowing in. The rest is history. Desert Blend has now been a Texas tradition for more than 25 years.