oldschool? or way forward.

[slugboy]

i have been wondering, the navy used to do the whole long term food thing.

has anyone thought about making sea biscuits/hard tack as part of their long term food supply.

they lasted months made correctly, so with modern tweeks like airtight containers and moisture absorbers they should last years.

[ynotshi]

why make i think these are similar to what you want and they last for years
http://evaq8.co.uk/EMERGENCY-FOOD-RATIO ... cuits.html
they are cheap enough and are compact to have on you

[TorNicho]

why make i think these are similar to what you want and they last for years
http://evaq8.co.uk/EMERGENCY-FOOD-RATIO ... cuits.html
they are cheap enough and are compact to have on you

I have some of these in my Car EDC.

However, if making them is a simple task (and most likely cheaper), it may be worth doing.

Any Links??

[TorNicho]

1862....
May still be edible. !?!?!?

[TorNicho]

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Hard_Tack

Hard tack is a cracker/biscuit flat-bread used during long sea voyages and military campaigns before the introduction of canning as a primary food-source. Mostly inedible for dry and hard preservation, it was usually dunked in water, brine, coffee, or other liquids, or cooked into a skillet meal. This cracker was little more than flour and water which had been baked hard and would keep for months as long as it was kept dry. Also known as a sea biscuit, sea bread, or ship's biscuits.
[edit]Ingredients

2 cups of flour
¾ cup water
¾ teaspoon of salt (optional)
Optional/not traditional adjustment: This will make the crackers more palatable but mean that unlike traditional hard bread they will eventually spoil, even if properly stored.
1 tablespoon of shortening
[edit]Procedure

Mix all the ingredients into a dough and press onto a cookie sheet to a thickness of ½ inch.
Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (205°C) for half an hour. Don't cut now
Remove from oven, cut dough into 3-inch squares, and punch four rows of holes, four holes per row into the dough (a fork works nicely).
Flip the crackers and return to the oven for another half hour.
[edit]Notes, tips, and variations


Wikipedia has related information at Hardtack
Some recipes also recommend a second baking at 250°F (120°C) to thoroughly dry out the bread.
Scale ingredient quantities equally if more dough is required.

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http://www.ehow.com/how_2082699_make-ha ... ments.html

Instructions
1
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2
Combine water, adding as much as 2 cups, with 4 cups of flour and 4 teaspoons of salt. Gradually adding the water will keep the mixture from becoming too sticky. Knead thoroughly. It should feel elastic-like when complete. If too sticky, add more flour.

3
Flour a surface for rolling out the mixture. Roll out into a rectangular shape until roughly 1/2 inch in thickness.

4
Cut the hardtack dough into squares. A pizza cutter works well for this. Hardtack came in various sizes, depending on the company that manufactured it, but it typically was small enough to fit into one's pockets.

5
Take a fork and make holes in the dough, creating a look similar to today's saltines. Flip each hardtack over and make holes on the other side as well.

6
Put the dough on a cookie sheet. Do not grease the cookie sheet. Bake the hardtack for 30 minutes, flip and cook for another half an hour.

7
Take the hardtack to a war reenactment for the participants to sample. If not fresh, the hardtack should be difficult to break. Oftentimes hardtack was crumbled into coffee so it could be eaten.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Actually seems pretty simple.

[slugboy]

i have been doing a little research, basing it on scotts ill fated south pole exhibition.

scott had h and p hard tack, made from white flour and bicarb.
admundsen team (who beat scott to the pole and also survived) used a different long life bread which used wholemeal and apparently yeast.

there were also differences in the pemmican, where admundsens had oats and peas as well as the base beef and fat. which gave roughage.

the admundsen bread was more nutritious containing b vitamins, fibre and a host of other nutrition benefits over white four version.

as a side issue vitamin c deficiency was a major problem in scotts team, not admundsens, who had more fresh meat, cooked lighter and so kept its vit c content.

anyway, i digress.....

admundsens norwegian style hard tack was superior to scotts and this certainly played a part in admundsens teams survival. as such in a preparing for shtf situation, it would be prudent to follow their lead.

however i am finding it difficult to find a recipe for the norwegian type, (scotts h and p variety recipe is available and very like torNicho's recipe)

does anyone know where the admundsen variety recipe could be found?

[tigs]

i remember watching a hairy bikers program were they looked at the history of food , they went on board an old navy sailing ship to look at the food that made the British navy the best in the world , they were given a couple of the hardtack biscuits and some mutton stew , one of them tried to bite the hardtack and nearly broke his teeth !! they had to soak them in the stew for ages before they could eat them!!

[ForgeCorvus]

Hardtack=/= MRE

There are better things to store, things you can actually eat.


Saltines, Pilot bread or Water Biscuits...... Or just store flour


Ynotshi: Transfats.... SNM

[TorNicho]

You're right Forge. Maybe for just BOB, EDC and Car Kit.

[Technik]

why make i think these are similar to what you want and they last for years
http://evaq8.co.uk/EMERGENCY-FOOD-RATIO ... cuits.html
they are cheap enough and are compact to have on you

or these
http://shop.conserva.de/en/29-compact-food