The New Hunters Encyclopedia revised edition 1966
PEMMICAN .A form of concentrated food ,originally made of
beans,corn,and dried meat, mixed and compressed in a roll,
which served as trail rations for the Indian. Several forms
of pemmican are now on the market.
Favorite Camping Recipes 2003
Saskatoon Pemmican
1 c Jerky; beef or venison
1 c Dried Saskatoon berries or dried blueberries
1 c Unroasted sunflower seeds or crushed nuts of any kind
2 ts Honey
1/4 c Peanut butter
1/2 ts Cayenne [optional]
This version uses peanut butter rather than melted suet or lard as the binding agent, which is more
palatable for today's health conscious diets.
Grind [or pound] the dried meat to a mealy powder. Add the dried berries and seeds or nuts. Heat
the honey, peanut butter and cayenne until softened. Blend. When cooled, store in a plastic bag or
sausage casing in a cool dry place. It will keep for months.
Camping and Woodcraft Kephart 1957 p156
Pemmican.The staple commissary supply of
arctic travelers, and of hunters and traders in the
far Northwest, is pemmican. This is not so palatable as jerky, at least when carelessly prepared;
but it contains more nutriment, in a given bulk,
and is better suited for cold climates, on account of
the fat mixed with it.
The old-time Hudson Bay pemmican was made
from buffalo meat, in the following manner: first
a sufficient number of bags, about 2x1^ feet, were
made from the hides of old bulls that were unfit
for robes. The lean meat was then cut into thin
strips, as for jerky, and dried in the sun for two or
three days, or over a fire, until it was hard and
brittle. It was then pounded to a powder between
two stones, or by a flail, on a sort of hide threshingfloor with the edges pegged up. The fat and marrow were then melted and mixed with the powdered
lean meat to a paste; or, the bags were filled with
the lean and then the fat was run in on top. After
this the mass was well rammed down, and the bags
were sewed up tight. No salt was used ; but the
pemmican thus prepared would keep sweet for years
in the cool climate of the North. A piece as large
as one's fist, when soaked and cooked, would make
a meal for two men. When there was flour in the
outfit, the usual allowance of pemmican was i ^ to
I ^2 pounds a day per man, with one pound of flour
added. This was for men performing the hardest
labor, and whose appetites were enormous. Service
berries were sometimes added. "Officers' pemmican" was made from buffalo humps and marrow.
Pemmican nowadaj^s is made from beef. Bleasdell Cameron gives the following details: A beef
dressing 698 pounds yields 47 pounds of first-class pemmican,47
pounds of second-class pemmican^
and 23 pounds of dried meat, including tongues, a
total of 117 pounds, dried. The total nutritive
strength is thus reduced in weight to one-sixth that
of the fresh beef. Such pemmican, at the time he
wrote, cost the Canadian government about forty
cents a pound, equivalent to six pounds of fresh
beef.
Pemmican is sometimes eaten raw, sometimes
boiled with flour into a thick soup or porridge
called robiboo, or, mixed with flour and water and
fried like sausage, it is kno^vn as rascho. The pemmican made nowadays for arctic expeditions is prepared from the round of beef cut into strips and
kiln-dried until friable, then ground fine and mixed
with beef suet, a little sugar, and a few currants.
It is compressed into cakes, and then packed so as
to exclude moisture. It can be bought ready-made
in New York, but at an enormous price when sold
in small quantity, and the tins add considerably to
the weight. If one has home facilities he can make
it himself. Leave out the sugar, which makes meat
unpalatable to most men. The sugar item should be
separate in the ration.
Encyclopedia of the Antarctic Vol 1. Beau Riffenburgh 2007
On Equine pemmican:
[Ref Shackleton's 10 Manchurian ponies from northern China], Their food consisted of
20 tons of maize, 1000 pounds of Maujee ration, known as Equine pemmican (dried beef, carrots, milk, currants, and sugar), and 10 tons of compressed fodder of oats, bran, and chaff obtained in Australia.
