Has Anyone Ever Eaten Pemmican? It Sounds Utterly Disgusting!

[mawnansmiff]

As a major staple food of the fur trapping communities of the far North West, pemmican was a highly valued asset and apparently highly nutritious but its composition turns my stomach.
Resembling dehydrated dog food (apparently), it was made from pulverized buffalo meat mixed with melted tallow and Saskatoon berries, (though its actual composition varied by where it was made).
The ingredients for a ninety pound bag consisted of one buffalo to sixteen pounds of said berries. The buffalo flesh being dried in the sun of smoked over a fire afore pounding into a pulp. The animal's hide was then sewn into a rawhide 'sack' which was then filled with the desiccated meat, the berries were then added and boiling tallow added to the mix making a stinking sludge. Thoroughly stired, the bag was then sewn shut and sealed with more tallow.
Apparently this stuff had a considerable life. In 1934 a chap discovered 20 bags of pemmican that had been cached on his North Manitoba property some 80 years previous and claimed it tasted "like meat and retained some of its flavour"!
Rather you than me chum but I suppose it has to be better than boiled premature buffalo calf, beaver tails or dried caribou noses 8O
Enjoy your supper chaps ::
Regards,
Jay.

 

[jpmcwjr]

I read a book recently about the chap who accompanied Amundson on his explorations and in fact financed a good deal of them. Now, can I recall title of the book? Of course not. But IIRC (some doubt here!) he- Lincoln Ellsworth-, made his own pemmican to save money- and did it in the UK! So, buffalo meat being somewhat dear there, he used other tasty meats.
[Wiki:}

The specific ingredients used for pemmican were usually whatever was available. The meat was often bison, deer, elk, or moose. Fruits such as cranberries and saskatoon berries were sometimes added. Blueberries, cherries, chokeberries, and currants were also used, but almost exclusively in ceremonial and wedding pemmican

Ah, ceremonial pemmican! Yes! Perfect for that wedding night....
Looks tasty!

And cherries! Obviously appealing to the kiddie market, long before the FDA could intervene. But a nice topping to be sure. But I think I'd eat Haggis before choking down some pemmican.

 

[jaytex1969]

I can't say I've had that, but I did grow up eating Rapa Scrapple with Sunday breakfast.
Being tasty often promotes otherwise poor decision making in consumers.

 

[hawky454]

Yeah, that’s the snack I eat while I’m watching Game of Thrones. Mmmmmm, good nutritional snack!

 

[warren]

I have eaten what was termed "pemmmican", made by Southeast Alaskan natives, Tlingit. Elk, blueberries, cranberries, and some herbs, high energy it was. Taste varies according to the individual chef's?, recipe. Certainly no worse than some of the "energy bars" on the market today. Probably more nourishing also. Mostly tasted the meat and smoke. Smoked fish is another choice favored by the coastal aborigines in my part of the world.
I'd suggest most hunter/gatherer groups have similar concoctions which date centuries for the lone hunter needing a lightweight, healthy something which can be eaten while on the move. The Tatars had their raw meat heated on the flank of the horse and salted with horse sweat.

 

[warren]

I left out: Gamey, very gamey tasting as would be expected.

 

[ryeguy]

It sounds a lot like a confit. At least it's the same principle: preserving meat by sealing it in its own fat.

 

[mso489]

No, it doesn't sound good. I guess it solved an ever-present problem, and then you got really hungry. The problem was, how do you produce a high-protein sustaining diet that will keep for months or years. It is interesting that some of the Plains Indians ate almost exclusively meat, sometimes a variety of meats, because it was the only food sustaining enough that was light enough to haul, and then this version, with berries, that would keep. The closest food item in the current diet might be jerky and associated meat products.

 

[warren]

I don't know about the indigenous peoples eating almost exclusively meat. There is a veritable salad available in nearly any area sufficiently wet and arable. Wild onions, berries, various roots, etc are available all over the world. Granted meat is easy to transport, especially when properly prepared but, careful inspection of human dung shows a varied diet for most groups examined. Seaweed, cactus, assorted roots, wild potatoes, the usual berries, all the things man ate before he figured out how to kill animals. I wonder who came up with the first roasted meat? Steve Raichlen?

 

[anthonyrosenthal74]

Sounds tasty to me.

 

[Chasing Embers]

It is wonderful.

 

[frozenchurchwarden]

I love beef jerky so much I can only envy people who ate dried buffalo their whole lives.

 

[timelord]

Sounds OK to me; but then I was brought up eating Haggis, Black Pudding (aka blood sausage) and Brawn (basically pressed pigs head) and similar delicacies (possibly explains why I quite like Brazilian Feijoada too).
The picture of the ceremonial version looks a bit like a Christmas Pudding; given that traditional English recipes for mince pies and the like include minced beef as well as fruit could the two be related?

 

[ashdigger]

Good pemmican is delicious and bad pemmican is still good.
I grew up in a hunting family and we made pemmican from elk and jerky from mule deer. We'd fill our pockets, top off our canteens and we were set for the day.

 

[canucklehead]

I like pemmican, if it's made right. Also, it tastes a lot better than starvation.

 

[morgansteele]

Has Anyone Ever Eaten Pemmican?

Yes, but my generation calls it the McRib.

 

[mawnansmiff]

Thinking about it, I wonder if it vaguely resembles corned beef albeit sans the berries?
If that is the case then I would likely try it.
Regards,
Jay.

 

[mikethompson]

Interesting recipe. I remember making it in grade school, but there was no meat. I think it was just like a flour and water baked dough. I'm sure the name, method, and composition varies by region though.

 

[redglow]

There is a Pemmican Brand beef jerky in our convenience stores around here. I haven’t had it in a while. But I remember it being very good.
I guess if you’re living off the land, anything that keeps you alive is probably a tasty treat on a cold winters night.

 

[dukdalf]

"Ingredients for a ninety pound bag consisted of one buffalo to sixteen pounds of said berries". Assuming we're using a cow and the meat makes up about half her body weight, you'd have to reduce about 500 pounds of meat to a mere 74 pounds. Is that possible?