Revisiting hardtack

Randis said:

View attachment 357157

Put some "ship's biscuits" together. Used the recipe from Max Miller's YouTube channel. Not much of a recipe really. Stone ground whole wheat and water. Portioned each biscuit with 6 ounces of dough. Finished product ended up being about 4 ounces which means a daily ration of 4 biscuits. Gave it two 2 bakes. 1st was 300 degrees at 3 hours; Second bake 200 degrees for 2 hours. Color of finished product is due more to the whole wheat rather than the baking time. These things are rock hard. they "ping" when you knock them together. May function as an alternative to steel targets.

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blackhorse said:

My understanding is that one does not eat hardtack as a "cracker" they beat the snot out of it, turned it back into a powdery/crumbly consistency and used it in liquids such as broth (thickening) , coffee etc. and maybe even fried with it. I read where men would fry it in bacon grease. Most of my readings were land based and not so much sea going

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Nav said:

I'm not an expert, but I thought they usually soaked it in something to soften it rather than trying to nibble on a rock. I suppose bacon grease would work the same way, but if you can have bacon then why are you eating hard tack? People ate it unprepared for sure. I just assume that after a few weeks of living on it as the only staple you are going to do anything you can to make it less unpleasant.

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Folks, Hard Red Wheat, was introduced into the United States in 1874. It came out of Russia with the Moravians, and as such was NOT used for the 18th nor first half of the 19th century for Hard Tack or Ship's biscuit. Further, Mr. Miller kneads the dough for a 15 minutes YET he quoted a source that had the flour becoming dough and then unbaked ships biscuits and then into the oven, all in one minute.

So the hard wheat has a LOT more protein than the soft white wheat that they used back then. When you knead hard red wheat for that long period of time, you develop the protein into strings, so you are actually making it harder.

IF you really want to make proper ships biscuit, you need to use what we today call Soft Whole Wheat Pastry Flour, which is made from white wheat. AND you need to simulate the grade of flour which was called "ship's stuff" and was the lowest grade, and had a good deal of bran with it. When made with that flour, without kneading, and some bran, you get a hard cracker that can be chewed upon to be consumed, something that is shown in early journals.

By the ACW the quality of the flour was better but it was still what we today call Whole Wheat Pastry Flour, and they may have mistakenly kneaded the flour for a long time, thus it was harder than it should have been or needed to be.

Earlier in this thread you can find a recipe for ships biscuit with whole wheat pastry flour that yields the hard cracker but can be gnawed upon and consumed without soaking. I have a test batch in an airtight, see through container, and the stuff is 24 months old as of Tuesday... no mold so still good.

LD

... no mold so still good.

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Nav said:

"Good" being a relative word in relation to mold.

I have online conversations all the time about creating delicious things using the culinary arts to make and eat. This is like a competition to create the most inedible, non-poisonous "food" possible.

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Nav said:

It's not like you can take it backwards and make anything out of it. Once it's in hard tack that's it. Best you can do is wet it with something so it doesn't break your teeth.

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Jay Templin said:

But that’s not actually the case. Ships’ biscuit was commonly reconstituted for use in making pies and other dishes at sea at least as far back as the 1570s. We’ve done it for years at the museum. You break it up into powder, add some fat and water, and it makes a dough like pie crust. It’s also good for making a roux to thicken soups and stews. We did an experiment one time with soaking biscuit to soften it, and in cold water or small beer, it literally took a day or two to soften to where you could bite it. Most of what you see about just dunking it in your grog or wetting it is fantasy made up by authors with no actual experience working with the stuff.
Jay

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