It has been truly remarked with reference to Australian exploring expeditions, that if an exploring party would make up their minds to eat horseflesh, stores of provisions might be largely dispensed with. A few extra horses could be taken; and one shot occasionally, and its flesh dried and slightly salted, sufficiently to preserve it from becoming tainted before the men could consume it.
Portable Food.--The kinds of food that are the most portable in the ordinary sense of the term are:--Pemmican; meat-biscuit; fried meat; dried fish; wheat flour; biscuit; oatmeal; barley; peas; cheese; sugar; preserved potatoes; and Chollet's compressed vegetables. Extract of meat, as I am assured by the highest physiological authors, is not a portable food but a portable savour. It is quite impossible that life should be maintained on any minute amount of material, because so many grains of carbon and so many of nitrogen are daily consumed, and an equivalent weight of those elements must, of course, be replaced. Salt meat is not to be depended upon, for it is liable to become hard and worthless, by long keeping.
Pemmican; general remarks.--Of all food usually carried on expeditions, none is so complete in itself, nor contains so large a proportion of nutriment as pemmican. It is especially useful to those who undergo severe work, in cold and rainy climates. It is the mainstay of Arctic expeditions, whether on water, by sledge, or on foot. But, though excellent to men who are working laboriously, it is distasteful to others.
Pemmican is a mixture of about five-ninths of pounded dry meat to four-ninths of melted or boiled grease; it is put into a skin bag or tin can whilst warm and soft. The grease ought not to be very warm, when poured on the dry meat. Wild berries are sometimes added. The skin bags for the pemmican should be shaped like pillow (not bolster) cases, for the convenience of packing on horseback. The pemmican is chopped out with an axe, when required.
I do not know if it can be bought anywhere in England. It was usually prepared in the government yards at Deptford, when made for the Arctic Expeditions. It is largely used in the Hudson's Bay territory. A traveller who desired to furnish himself with pemmican might procure his supplies from thence.
Pemmican, as made in England.--Sir John Richardson describes, in his Narrative, the preparation of the pemmican that he took with him in his last journey. The following is a résumé of what he says:--The meat used was round of beef; the fat and membranous parts were pared away; it was then cut into thin slices, which were dried in a malt-kiln, over an oak-wood fire, till they were quite dry and friable. Then they were ground in a malt mill; after this process the powder resembled finely-grated meal. It was next mixed with nearly an equal weight of melted beef, suet, or lard; and the plain pemmican was made. Part of the pemmican was mixed with Zante currants, and another part with sugar. Both of these mixtures were much liked, especially the latter. The pemmican, when complete, cost at the rate of 1x. u 1/2 d. per pound, but then the meat was only 6 3/4 d. per pound; it is dearer now. The meat lost more than three-quarters of its weight in drying. He had 17,424 lbs. of pemmican in all; it was made from--fresh beef, 35,641 lbs; lard9 lbs.; currants3 lbs.; and sugar lbs.
Pemmican, as made in the Prairie.--Mr. Ballantyne, who was in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company, gives the following account:--"Having shot a buffalo, the hunters cut lumps of his flesh, and slitting it up into flakes or layers, hang it up in the sun, or before a slow fire, to dry; and the fat can be dried as well as the lean. In this state, it is often made into packs, and sent about the country, to be consumed as dried meat (it is often best relished raw, for, when grilled without fat, it burns and becomes ashy); but when pemmican is wanted, it has to go through another process. When dry, the meat is pounded between two stones till it is broken into small pieces: these are put into a bag made of the animal's hide, with the hair on the outside, and well mixed with melted grease; the top of the bag is then sewn up, and the pemmican allowed to cool. In this state it may be eaten uncooked; but the men who subsist on it when travelling, mix it with a little flour and water, and then boil it--in which state it is know throughout the country by the elegant name of robbiboo. Pemmican is good wholesome food; will keep fresh for a great length of time; and, were it not for its unprepossessing appearance, and a good many buffalo hairs mixed with it, through the carelessness of the hunters, would be very palatable. After a time, however, one becomes accustomed to these little peculiarities."
Meat-biscuit.--Meat-biscuit, which is used in American ships, is stated to be a thick soup, evaporated down to a syrup, kneaded with flour, and made into biscuits: these are pricked with holes, dried and baked. They can be eaten just as they are, or made into a porridge, with from twenty to thirty times their weight of water. They were to be bought at Gamble's, Leadenhall Street.
Dried Meat.--When more game is shot than can be eaten before the party travel onwards, it is usual to jerk a part of it. It is cut in long strips, and festooned about the bushes, under the full sun, in order to dry it. After it has been sun-dried it will keep for long, before it becomes wholly putrid. Dried meat is a poor substitute for fresh meat; it requires long steeping in water, to make it tender, and then it is tasteless, and comparatively innutritious. "Four expert men slice up a full-grown buffalo in four hours and a-half." (Leichhardt.) The American buccaneers acquired their name from boucan--which means jerked meat, in an Indian dialect; for they provisioned their ships with the dried flesh of the wild cattle that they hunted down and killed.
Dried Fish.--Fish may be pounded entire, just as they come from the river, dried in the sun in large lumps, and kept: the negroes about the Niger do this.