There’s a lyric in the song “Avalon” by Roxy Music: “The picture’s changing every moment/And your destination, you don’t know it.” Avalon Meat Candy wasn’t named after this masterful piece of pop music, but it’s fitting.
The meat candy here is beef jerky, likely the most high-end dried meat in Las Vegas. As owner Christian Petersen explains, “It’s a passion for the ultimate beef jerky.” A Coast Guard veteran, Petersen owns a successful electric contracting company, also called Avalon. Until recently, his jerky game was being perfected at home and often with customers who required his electrician services. “One of my finest calling cards I can give somebody has got a nice piece of homemade jerky attached to it,” he says.
Avalon Meat Candy has been open for only a few months in a large shopping complex on Silverado Ranch and Maryland Parkway. All jerky is prepared and cooked on-site, and using great ingredients is paramount to the quality. Petersen scours the state for the best local elements to utilize—inside top-round cuts of certified Angus beef from Desert Meat & Provisions, spice blends from Sheffield Spice & Tea Co. and fresh local honey.
Petersen, along with his wife Yvonne and son and daughter-in-law Jerry and Malarie Martin—both in the Coast Guard—use these high quality ingredients to take this familiar snack in some new directions. Flavors include fireball, reminiscent of the hot cinnamon candy; General Tso, an accurate send-up of the Chinese chicken dish; and sriracha-yaki. Avalon also offers gluten-free jerky and can accommodate flavor profiles based on customers’ desires, and takes the same philosophy with other products, from fruit leather to chocolate-covered marshmallows.
Avalon Meat Candy 9770 S. Maryland Parkway #1, 702-636-5000. Monday-Friday, 6 a.m.-8:30 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m.-8:30 p.m.
