Getting ready and testing dinner.

[tenngun]

About a month ago I made a few pounds of salt pork, last week made a couple pounds of ships bread. Going to the pomme de terror rendezvous next week so I had to test out my preservers.
Took 1/2 a cup of dried peas, 6 oz freashened salt pork dash of pepper, garlic, some crushed herbs, on the boil a couple of hours, crushed a hunk of ships bread, cup of sac, cooked till thick. Served with a ration of stout...emmmm.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Dang Tenn, That sounds yummy!... :thumbsup:

Where do you get the sac? or do you just use sherry?

 

[Silky921]

Is ships bread different than ships biscuits?

 

[coloradoclyde]

I say yes!...Ships bread is hardtack.....ships biscuit is more like a cookie....
I'm probably wrong but that's the way I make them....

 

[Silky921]

Guess I need to find a recipe on something new to make! My ships biscuits, while tasty, could break the jaw of a lion if not prepared correctly.

 

[coloradoclyde]

These are good and won't break your jaw.....
The ships biscuit/ hardtack would be better for soup though....
[youtube]/rWYtmcEXgPw[/youtube]

 

[tenngun]

Mine are too hard to bite or cut with a knife. It's just whole wheat flour a little salt and water to make a paste. Cooked low and slow till baked, about 4 hours at 250.
I understand ships bread, ships biscuit pilots bread and hard biscuit are all the same thing. Hard tack was a term from later, WTBS and Indian wars. :idunno:
I used dry sherry, my taste may not be as fine as wines labeled sac and cheaper dry sherry taste the same to me.

 

[coloradoclyde]

I like golden sherry..... :thumbsup: I use it all the time for cooking.....and a glass for the cook. :haha:

 

[Loyalist Dave]

Actually "hard tack" was a general term for any hardened bread product, while "soft tack" was for yeast breads.

The number one problem with DIY ship's biscuits is that folks use the wrong flour (imho-hbc) :grin: .

The flour of the 18th century and into the 19th century is what we call today, Whole Wheat Pastry Flour. The hard, red, "winter wheat" that is used for "whole wheat" flour today wasn't around back then, and it has a lot more gluten, and thus you bake them into rifle targets, not into an edible item.

PLUS..., the flour used for ship's biscuit was made from the lowest grade flour, known as "ship's stuff"..., which had a lot of bran and chaff (and probably straw) in it. So..., when I make them, I add about 1/3 to 1/2 Wheat Bran. This still gives you a nice, hard cracker with a loooong shelf life, but you can actually eat it plain as sources from the time period show.

LD

 

[tenngun]

Well there is a good idea. Will have to try that next time.
Recreating historic food runs in to problems. Some stuff we just can't get. Our apples and pigs hadn't been bred yet. Thier apples and pigs are not grown now.
In Food In History, Rea Tenninghill asked about spices for recreating Roman dishes. How do our spices compare with spices stored in the belly of a leaky poorly ventilated ship for a couple-three years.
CC asked about sac, so common then but I can't tell sac I buy today from dry sherry.