by Leon Pantenburg

Some useful, very basic, recipes should be included any prepper/survival/ Bug Out backpack. It’s one thing to have staples, such as flour, but another to be able to consume them. And you need some very simple recipes for

It only took the addition of some other grains to make this basic bannock survival ration into a tasty, nutricious food.

those times when you might only have a few ingredients.

After posting some emergency survival recipes for flour last week, I whipped up some bannock to make sandwiches for a spur-of-the-moment hike.

Sitting in the shadow of Monkey Face, in Central Oregon’s magnificent Smith Rock State Park, eating my delicious bannock and turkey sandwich, I thought about how happy I was to be there!  (The trail across the top of the rock formations is the appropriately-named “Misery Trail” and I’d had a knee replacement in September, 2009!) It also occurred to me, how easy it would be to tweak the bannock recipe to make it more healthy and nutritious.

Bannock is the traditional bread of Canada and the Northwest. Native people had no access to wheat  flour prior to the arrival of European traders, although some flour substitutes existed, like wild turnips or corn, dried and ground to a powder.

Bannock actually originated in Scotland. Because bannock could be quickly prepared from readily-available ingredients, and because these ingredients lasted a long time without spoiling, bannock became a staple of European fur traders and subsequently, the native people also.

But the original recipe is nothing but flour and water, and traditional bannock is  essentially frontier junk food.

Here’s how to add a few ingredients to make flour-based  survival foods more nutritious.

Start by amending the  flour. Basic, white, bleached all-purpose flour has virtually all the nutrients taken out of it in processing. To each cup of white flour, add one tablespoon of soy flour, a tablespoon of dried milk and a teaspoon of wheat germ. According to “Classic Sourdoughs: A Home Baker’s Handbook” by Ed Wood, such an amendment combines enzymes and creates a complete protein, similar to meat.

I’ve used this amendment for years, and you can’t taste the difference in the baked goods. Try amending the flour in all your survival recipes that use white flour, such as hardtack, and you’ll feel the difference.  Here is the traditional bannock recipe:

Bannock recipe

1 c flour

4 tsp double-acting baking powder

2 Tbs powdered skim milk

Stir ingredients together; stir in water to make dough moist. Knead dough until smooth. Place in greased cast iron skillet or Dutch oven over the campfire or on coals and bake about five to 10 minutes until the top is brown. Then turn the bread and brown the other side.

A handy way to prepare for a backpacking or hiking trip is to mix all the dry ingredients in a Ziplock bag. Just add 1/2 cup of water and knead in the bag. Then take out the dough, finish kneading and spread it in the pan.

(Practice baking the bannock by the campfire. Put the dough in a greased skillet, and place it near the campfire, propped at about a 60-degree angle with a stick. Lodge Pro-Logic 10″ Skillet Preaseasoned
When the side nearest the fire browns, flip the bread and brown the other side. In a pinch you could bake it on a plank!)

SurvivalCommonSense Bannock Recipe

1/8 tsp salt

1 Tbs soy flour

1 tsp buckwheat flour

1 Tbs flax meal

2 Tbs stone ground whole wheat flour

4 tsp double-acting baking powder

Pace all the above ingredients in a one cup measure and add enough unbleached bread flour to make one cup of dry ingredients in volume.  Add  2 Tbs powdered skim milk, and stir until thoroughly mixed.

Add enough moisture to make a moist dough, and knead until smooth. Place in a greased cast iron skillet and bake. If you’re making this inside, bake at 425 degrees for about 20 minutes.

Except for the different ingredients, you can treat the improved recipe just like the traditional. Put the improved bannock mixture in a ziplock bag to make later on the trail, and you can cook it just like the traditional recipe.

With either recipe, bannock is a quick, easy way to make use of wheat flour. Both recipes are good survival tools that could prove to be really useful in your survival kit!

(Here’s a way to add some poetry and fun to your next campout: Mix up one of the above recipes and get it started cooking over the fire. Then whip out this Robert Service poem and read aloud: While the Bannock Bakes.)

Product Links:

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Lodge Cast Iron Products
Camp Chef Cooking Products

For more related SurvivalCommonSense.com tips and stories, click on the highlighted words:

• STOP: Use this exercise to reduce stress and focus your thoughts.
• Write a note to let people know where you went, before you left.
• Take your Ten Essentials on every outing.
• Dress with the right fabrics.
• Have a plan to make a tarp shelter.
• Carry lightweight, compact firestarter.
• Find the most effective fire ignition system.
• How to make charcloth, a material that can catch a spark from any source.
• Use charcloth as an effective method of catching a spark to make a fire.
• It can kill you: Hypothermia
• Hardtack: A great emergency food
• About Leon Pantenburg

By Leon Pantenburg

Hardtack is easy to make, has a long shelf life, and the texture of a fired brick! It is definately a survival food, but you wouldn't want to eat it for long periods of time!

One my best learning experiences was serving a year in VISTA on the Omaha Indian Reservation in Macy, Nebraska. The experience was life-changing for me, and stories of the rez would fill a book! My Omaha friends and I delighted in our cultural differences, but when it came to food we all loved the traditional Omaha dishes of corn soup, beans and fry bread.

Here’s the story I was told about the food: As the Omahas were forced onto reservations in the late 1870s, they were also forced into survival mode. The people would be issued monthly rations of flour, beans, parched corn or cornmeal and, if they were lucky, a few cattle. That would be it until the next distribution.

So the Omahas and other tribes created recipes to use the government-issued food. Beans were simmered with salt pork. Parched corn became the basis of corn soup, along with some sort of meat. Fry bread only had three ingredients.

My friend, Norma Leigh Dixon, made the best fry bread. She laughed when I asked for the recipe.

“What recipe?” she said. “You just mix flour, baking powder and water and fry it. That’s why it’s called fry bread!”

Some useful recipes should be included any prepper/survival/ Bug Out backpack. It’s one thing to have staples, such as flour, but another to be able to consume them. What happens during a survival situation, when you end up with a bag of flour, some baking powder, a campfire and hungry children?

You could eat flour out of the bag, I suppose. Or, you could mix it with water and make a sort of pasty gruel. But you’d have to be really hungry to choke that mess down, and at some point, the youngsters might just quit eating.

One way to make the best use of basic food staples is to have good recipes! Here are a couple of suggestions to make flour and water into a more tasty survival ration.

Bannock is the traditional bread of Canada and the Northwest. Native people had no access to flour prior to the arrival of European traders, although some flour substitutes existed, like wild turnips or corn, dried and ground to a powder.

Bannock actually originated in Scotland. Because bannock could be quickly prepared from readily available ingredients, and because these ingredients lasted a long time without spoiling, bannock became a staple of European fur traders and subsequently, the native people also.

Bannock is quick to make wherever you are. These were baked on the spur-of-the-moment when I needed bread for lunch.

Bannock recipe

1 c flour

4 tsp double-acting baking powder

2 Tbs powdered skim milk

Stir ingredients together; stir in water to make dough moist. Knead dough until smooth. Place in greased cast iron skillet or Dutch oven and bake it about five to 10 minutes over the campfire or on coals until it is brown on the bottom, then flip it, and brown the other side.

A handy way to prepare for a backpacking or hiking trip is to mix all the dry ingredients in a Ziplock bag. Just add 1/2 cup water and knead in the bag. Then take out the dough, finish kneading and spread it in the pan.

(Practice baking the bannock by the campfire. Put the dough in a greased skillet, and place it near the campfire, propped at about a 60-degree angle with a stick. Lodge Pro-Logic 10″ Skillet Preaseasoned
When the side nearest the fire browns, flip the bread and brown the other side. In a pinch you could bake it on a plank!)

Fry Bread

To quote my friend Norma Leigh: “What recipe?” Use essentially the same combination of ingredients as for bannock, and fry in hot oil in a Dutch oven or skillet. Brown on both sides and serve hot.

Hardtack

 Hardtack is one of the original trail and emergency foods. Hardtack is simple to make, transports easily and will last a reasonably long time if stored in plastic bags or containers. The disadvantage is the bland taste, and traditional toughness.

(It only takes a few additional ingredients to turbocharge  the nutritional value of hardtack. To each cup of flour in the recipe, add one tablespoon of soy flour, one teaspoon of wheat germ and one teaspoon of powdered milk. There is no difference in the taste, and these ingredients combine to make the bread a complete protein.)

Hardtack Recipe

Ingredients:

• 4 cups flour (preferably whole wheat)
• 4 teaspoons salt
• Water (about 2 cups)
• Pre-heat oven to 375° F
• Makes about 10 pieces

Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl. Add just enough water (less than two cups) so that the mixture will stick together, producing a dough that won’t stick to hands, rolling pin or pan. Mix the dough by hand. Roll the dough out, shaping it roughly into a rectangle. Cut into the dough into squares about 3 x 3 inches and ½ inch thick.

After cutting the squares, press a pattern of four rows of four holes into each square, using a nail or other such object. Do not punch through the dough. The appearance you want is similar to that of a modern saltine cracker.  Turn each square over and do the same thing to the other side.

Place the squares on an ungreased cookie sheet in the oven and bake for 30 minutes. Turn each piece over and bake for another 30 minutes. The crackers should be slightly brown on both sides.

The fresh crackers are easily broken, but as they dry, they harden.

Product Links:
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Lodge Cast Iron Products
Camp Chef Cooking Products
Campfire and Outdoor Cooking

For more related SurvivalCommonSense.com tips and stories, click on the highlighted words:

• STOP: Use this exercise to reduce stress and focus your thoughts.
• Write a note to let people know where you went, before you left.
• Take your Ten Essentials on every outing.
• Dress with the right fabrics.
• Have a plan to make a tarp shelter.
• Carry lightweight, compact firestarter.
• Find the most effective fire ignition system.
• How to make charcloth, a material that can catch a spark from any source.
• Use charcloth as an effective method of catching a spark to make a fire.
• It can kill you: Hypothermia
• Hardtack: A great emergency food
• About Leon Pantenburg

by Leon Pantenburg

The hunting season had been very productive: I was single at the time, didn’t have to worry about Honey-dos around the house and hunted every weekend in those magnificant decidious forests, swamps and wetlands of Mississippi.  In

Venison and other big game meats are commonly associated with jerky, but there are other meats that can also be used. (Pantenburg photos)

addition to harvesting several limits of squirrels and rabbits, and more than two dozen ducks, I’d also legally killed two deer with a blackpowder rifle.

Though I lived off the wild game harvest, a single guy just can eat so much. During the late summer, when the next hunting season started approaching I started turning the surplus game in my freezer into jerky. Making jerky of venison is common, but few think to make it out of small game animals.

Jerky is nothing more than dried meat.  Every prepper, survivalist, backpacker or outdoorsperson should be aware how easy it is to make and carry this emergency ration. Every emergency or wilderness survival kit, (along with that critical survival knife, Cold Steel 38CK SRK Survival Knife) should include some sort of  energy source. Jerky can be one of those foods. It’s light, long-lasting, tastes good,  and allows you to convert a small game surplus into a survival tool.

Jerky is also a great, nutricious snack at the office, as opposed to hitting the vending machine at break.  And talk about historical connectiveness: Include some jerky and hardtack in your next outing. Lunch will be what the pioneers, Native Americans,  or settlers had! It can help you develope a real appreciation of life on the frontier. 

Beef or venison jerky is a great snack, either on the trail or in the office.

I’ve made jerky out of whatever small game meat was was left in the freezer, combined with some of the left-over less-desirable pieces of venison. Combine whatever meats are available, and get a truly unique blend!

Here’s a few tips for making multi-game jerky:

• Any wild game recipe starts with cleanliness. Great-tasting meat starts with field dressing  ASAP after the animal is killed and cooling the meat quickly. Make sure the meat is as clean as possible before it is frozen. Remove any hair, dirt or debris before packaging. 
• When you thaw out the game package, trim off all membranes, connective tissue and fat.
• You can fillet and slice some of  the breast meat off geese or large ducks, and you could follow a recipe to smoke or bake strips. While you can whittle the rest of the meat off the bones, it’s much easier to boil the carcasses until
  

  Small game meat, such as squirrel, duck and rabbit can make great-tasting jerky!

  the meat comes off. Don’t throw away the broth – it can be the basis of a wonderful stew.

• Cool the meat, then grind and mix it. Use this recipe below and you’ll end up with a great survival ration.

Making Ground Meat Jerky…The Basic Method

Spread five pounds of ground meat out in a large, flat pan. Sprinkle two tablespoons of canning salt and one and one-half teaspoons of Tender Quick® curing mix evenly over the surface of the meat. Mix thoroughly, flatten into the pan, and cover with plastic wrap. Place in the fridge.

Mix the ground jerky meat thoroughly twice a day for two more days. This distributes the salt and cure mix, Smokehouse Products Original Jerky Mix, 10-Pack and allows time for the meat to become properly cured.

When the ground meat is mixed for the last time, add the remaining ingredients, mixing thoroughly. Form and dehydrate. To form the ground jerky, you can use a jerky shooter, Jumbo Jerky Gun w/3 Tips Md: BJX-1SK. a rolling pin, or your hands. A food dehydrator is perfect for drying the jerky, but the oven can do a fine job as well.

Store the finished jerky in a sealed plastic bag or a tightly sealed jar. I keep mine in the refrigerator to help it stay fresh longer.

Pack jerky in your kids’ lunches, or as a snack at work, and you’ll soon use up all the wild game meat.

 Recommended Reading:

Jerky Processing
Jerky: Make Your Own Delicious Jerky and Jerky Dishes Using Beef, Venison, Fish, or Fowl
The Ultimate Cookbook Of Great Jerky Recipes – 100 Delicious Jerky Recipes!

Related Links:
Are you prepared?

Lodge Cast Iron Cooking

Jerky and Outdoor Cookbooks

For more related SurvivalCommonSense.com tips and stories, click on the highlighted words:

• STOP: Use this exercise to reduce stress and focus your thoughts.
• Write a note to let people know where you went, before you left.
• Take your Ten Essentials on every outing.
• Dress with the right fabrics.
• Have a plan to make a tarp shelter.
• Carry lightweight, compact firestarter.
• Find the most effective fire ignition system.
• How to make charcloth, a material that can catch a spark from any source.
• Use charcloth as an effective method of catching a spark to make a fire.
• It can kill you: Hypothermia
• Hardtack: A great emergency food
• About Leon Pantenburg
  
  .

by Leon Pantenburg

In an emergency, let’s hope you have food and know how to cook it. But what happens if you end up with a fire, some

All you need to make a foil dinner is aluminum foil, food and a heat source.

food staples and no way to prepare it? In that case, you need to have mastered campfire cooking using the aluminum foil wrap.

In a survival situation, food should taste good. When (fill in the acronym) happens, previously-fussy eaters will find that hunger is the best sauce. But the same diet everyday will soon grow monotonous. Really, how many MREs can you eat before all the entrees taste the same?

Most people will eat whatever is available because they are hungry. But what about the old folks, little kids and toddlers? Diet monotony, or bland, repetitive tastes can cause them to just quit eating.

Obviously, this is dangerous – without the food energy, their bodies can’t produce warmth, they will grow weaker and their mental outlook and the group morale will deteriorate.

So food preparation in survival situations is important, and tasty food can start with just a piece of aluminum foil. (I carry a big piece in most of my survival kits!) As part of a survival scenario, consider where you might be when disaster strikes, and what your needs might be.  If I’m hunting, fishing, hiking or participating in some other vigorous activity, then food is fuel. At the end of the day, I Hardtack is easy to make, has a long shelf life, and the texture of a fired brick! It is definately a survival food, but you wouldn't want to eat it for long periods of time! want a lot to eat, fast, and taste is not so important. If convenience is the major consideration, I’ll eat whatever is available. Frequently, that might be something like jerky and hardtack. But if I’m at a Central Oregon Dutch Oven Society outing, a group devoted to outdoor epicurean cuisine, then gourmet-style food prepared outside in a cast iron pot over coals is the reason for being there.Lodge Logic 8-Quart Camp Dutch Oven The lowly foil wrap can fit quite well into either category, and a well-prepared prepper or survivalist should know this survival technique.. A wrap is nothing more than food bound up in aluminum foil and cooked over campfire coals or on a grill over charcoal. The wrap can be the main course, a side dish or a dessert. Foil wrap food can be as simple as a foiled baking potato or ear of corn on the cob or as complicated as a delicate salmon filet smothered with fresh herbs and vegetables. At elk or deer hunting camp, we frequently prepare a simple foil wrap of sliced potatoes and onions seasoned with some garlic and gobbed with butter the night before. We hunt all the next day, and whoever gets to camp first starts the fire. By the time everyone gets back after dark, there is a nice bed of coals to use with the Dutch ovens and foil wraps. The wrap is tossed on the coals, biscuits are popped out of the tube into a Dutch oven, and elk or deer backstrap is sliced, dredged in flour and fried. Total time for a great meal is about 30 minutes. Lodge Logic 6-qt. Camp Dutch Oven with Lid – Black Foil wraps are simple and fun and are a great way to make lunch with your kids. A wrap can make a nice meal to take along on an outing or day hike. A foil wrap stored in a plastic bag can be perfect for a noon meal in the backcountry. And everyone can make their own, dictated by their own tastes. As a cooking merit badge counselor for Boy Scout Troop 18, I frequently run across youngsters who, according to their parents, are very fussy eaters. Wraps can change that. Let the youngster decide what ingredients go into a wrap for lunch or dinner, but make sure there are veggies, some soup for a broth and fish or meat. The novelty of building your very own fire, and cooking over it, plus the positive peer pressure of the other kids will overshadow previous food prejudices. In wilderness cooking, every recipe should start with soap and water or hand sanitizer. Even though the cooking conditions may be primitive, sanitation shouldn’t be, and a case of dysentery or giardia can taint those otherwise great memories. Food preparation with foil wraps is simplicity itself, and for short day trips, all the cutting and dicing can be done at home. For longer trips, some dishes can be pre-made, wrapped and frozen. Insulate the frozen food well, place it in the bottom of your pack, and it should thaw out in time to make a fresh, hearty meal for the second night out. To wrap the food, place it in the center of a rectangular piece of heavy duty foil, then bring the long edges together on top. Fold the long edge over once, then continue roll-folding until it’s snug over the food. There should be several inches at each open end that are clear of food. This Dutch oven cobbler uses canned fruit and cake mix to create a tasty dessert. Then, roll the ends in tightly, compressing the food and making sure that each end has at least three complete rolls. This prevents juices from escaping during cooking and gives you something to hang on to when turning the packet. Sometimes, depending on what’s cooking, you’ll want to double wrap the packet. To avoid any leakage while transporting, put the completed package in a plastic bag. Then, when you’re done eating, put all the leftovers and used foil in the bag and carry it out. (Sounds like a tasty MRE, right?) Temperatures for foil wrap cooking are best learned through experience and will depend to a certain extent on what is in the wrap. But a good rule of thumb is that the coals should be hot enough that you can place your hand an inch above the grate for about five seconds, but no longer, without discomfort. You may put the wrap directly in the coals of a campfire, but make sure the fire isn’t too hot. A good idea is to rake some coals away from the flames and place the wrap directly on them. Obviously, you’ll need to watch the wrap closely. Food is a critical item among preppers, survivalists, outdoorspeople  and anyone who needs energy. Storing and preserving food is a consideration for whatever disaster and/emergency might happen. But regardless of what stockpiled food you may have or what you cook, a little planning, preparation and foil can make a great meal. And that’s a wrap. Try these recipes with your kids, or outdoors beginners to teach the foil wrap technique: ENGLISH MUFFIN PIES 2 TSP butter or margarine 1 English muffin, split 12-inch square of foil 3 TBS canned pie filling, any flavor Butter the outside of the muffin and place down on the shiny side of the foil. Top with pie filling. Butter the other muffin half and place on top of the fruit. Roll the foil over the muffin and make sure the ends are securely rolled. Cook for about 15 minutes, moving the packet every few minutes. When done, the outside of the muffin should be browned. Be careful the filling will be extremely hot. Let cool before eating. HERBED FISH AND CARROTS 18-inch square of foil 2 whole small carrots 1 TBS of margarine or butter 1/2 tsp of dried herb mix 1/4 tsp lemon pepper or garlic pepper Fresh fish fillets, about four to five ounces Lay foil shiny side down on flat surface. Peel carrots and slice 1/4-inch thick. Arrange down the center of the foil. Cut butter into pats and distribute over the carrots. Place fish on top of the carrots and sprinkle the herbs and lemon pepper over the fillet. Cut the remaining butter into pats and distribute over the fish. Fold the foil around the fish and place the packet fish side upon coals. Cook for about 15 minutes, then flip and cook another eight to 10 minutes. To serve, carefully open the packet; serve directly from the foil or transfer all the contents to an individual plate. FOILED AGAIN HAMBURGER DINNER 18-by-24-inch piece of heavy duty foil 1 TBS of barbecue sauce 1/4 small onion 5 ounces of lean ground beef or venison 1/4 tsp seasoned salt or garlic salt 1/2 small baking potato 1 medium carrot, peeled and sliced into pennies Fold the foil in half, shiny side in. Place the barbecue sauce in the center. Peel onion, slice and arrange over the sauce. Combine ground meat and seasoned salt, mix well and form into oblong patty, about 4-by-3-by-3/4 inches and place on top of the onions. Peel potato and carrot and slice both 1/8-inch thick. Top patty with potatoes and carrots. Fold foil over the ingredients and be sure to seal the ends very well. Place packet on grill or coals, and turn and rotate every 10 minutes. Total cooking time should be about 35 minutes. To check for doneness, open packet. Vegetables should be tender and meat should be medium-well. TROOP 18 FOIL WRAP COBBLER Pie filling White or yellow cake mix Pats of butter or margarine This is a beginner recipe that is very popular with kids or first-time campers and adapts the time-honored dump cake to foil. Place several tablespoons of pie filling on the foil, then top with cake mix and pats of butter. Fold the ingredients into the foil and place on the grill. Cook about 10 to 12 minutes on one side, then flip and cook another 5 to 10 minutes. Suggested Reading: Fix It In Foil Backpack Gourmet: Good Hot Grub You Can Make at Home, Dehydrate, and Pack for Quick, Easy, and Healthy Eating on the Trail For more related SurvivalCommonSense.com tips and stories, click on the highlighted words: STOP: Use this exercise to reduce stress and focus your thoughts. Write a note to let people know where you went, before you left. Take your Ten Essentials on every outing. Dress with the right fabrics. Have a plan to make a tarp shelter. Carry lightweight, compact firestarter. Find the most effective fire ignition system. How to make charcloth, a material that can catch a spark from any source. Use charcloth as an effective method of catching a spark to make a fire. It can kill you: Hypothermia Hardtack: A great emergency food About Leon Pantenburg

by Leon Pantenburg

In the wilderness, food is the  fuel your body burns to keep you warm and provide energy. You must be able to carry enough calories with you to offset those you’ll burn up. It’s like putting gas in your car: Without fuel, you won’t be able to go far. When your energy “tank” runs dry during an emergency, you will feel weak, cold and not have enough energy

Take healthy, high nutrition snacks along whenever you go into the wilderness.

to save yourself. Food, like your survival knife,  is one of the  Ten Essentials, and should be included, in some form, in your survival kit.

There are essentially three catagories of  wilderness cooking. My  hard-core foodie friends in the Central Oregon Dutch

 Oven Society represent one extreme. Their idea of a good time is to take their Dutch ovens Lodge Logic 8-Quart Camp Dutch Oven
and related gear, find a beautiful spot outdoors and cook meals that would please a gourmet. At the other extreme is the hunter or backpacker. When I’m doing either of those activities, all I want is fuel. Taste is secondary to calories. Meal Ready to Eat (MRE), 12 Pack Case, Ration

When it comes to backpacking or survival food, most of us want to be somewhere in the middle. We want high-calorie, good-tasting food that doesn’t weight much. Cost and long shelf life is also a consideration. There are many excellent commercial energy bars, Clifbar Builders Protein Bar – 12 Pack
but you can make your own much cheaper. An added benefit is that you can tweak the recipes to your tastes, and you know where the ingredients come from.

Even if you don’t go camping or backpacking (If that’s the case, you have my sympathy!) tasty energy bars, with a good shelf life, are great additions to your prepper supplies. Good taste and variety in survival food can be very important in survival situations. Anything you’re forced by circumstances to eat day-after-day will get really boring.  Small children may refuse to eat at all unless the food tastes good. Short of force-feeding the kids, there may be no other way to get them to eat. Clif Bar Clif Kid Z Bar – Box of 18

 Here are some homemade energy bar recipes that are  full of good ingredients and will help supply that needed energy

Hardtack is easy to make, has a long shelf life, and the texture of a fired brick! It is definately a survival food for times when enough calories are the big concern!

 boost. Wrap the bars individually and make extras for tucking into school backpacks, survival kits and daypacks.

Ingredients:

• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• l tsp. vanilla extract
• l cup granola
• 1/2 cup raisins (or any chopped dried fruit)
• 1/2 cup chopped hazelnuts (or your favorite nut)
• 1 1.69-oz. pkg. M&M’s chocolate candies (or you can substitute carob chips)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Generously butter or oil an 8- x 8-inch square pan (preferably nonstick). Crack the egg into a medium-sized bowl. Add the sugar and vanilla extract and mix thoroughly. Stir in the granola, raisins, hazelnuts and M&M’s and mix until combined. The M&M’s can be replaced with carob chips, which will cut down on the sugar content.

Transfer to the pan and distribute evenly over the bottom, pressing firmly with your hands. Bake for 25 minutes. Cool and cut into bars or squares. Serves 8 to 12.

The trick here is to let the homemade energy bar cool! Getting those “hungry peddlers” in your home to wait long enough might be a chore! Your chances are better if these are made when they’re not around, but only if you can resist the temptation yourself.

Emergency Ration Recipe

By: various survival sites

• 3 cups rolled oats, barley, or wheat
• 2 1/2 cups nonfat milk powder
• 1/2 package Jell-O powder, citrus
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoon honey
• 3 tablespoon water

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Heat together water and honey, stir in Jell-O powder. Stir dry ingredients together, stir in Jell-O water, mix well. Then add additional water 1 tablespoon at a time, just until mixture can be formed into two bars. Dry in oven, wrap in foil to store. Each bar is 1000 calories. May be eaten as is, or cooked in a pint of water.

Apricot Bar Recipe

Chop in a food processor:

• 1 cup apricots
• 3/4 cup almonds
• 3/4 cup walnuts
• Mix fruit and nuts with:
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup wheat germ
• 2/3 cup flour
• 2 tablespoons oil

Add: Enough liquid (2 to 4 tablespoons juice) to form thick batter.

Mix well. Press into an 8-by-8-inch square greased pan. Bake 30 minutes or until firm. Cut into 12 bars but leave in the pan to cool. Later, package individually and store in a refrigerator or freezer. Makes 12 bars with 220 calories/bar.

No-bake power bites recipe

• 1/2 cup chopped dates
• 1/2 cup figs (stemmed)
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1/4 cup wheat germ
• 5 tablespoons nonfat dry milk powder
• 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

In food processor, combine first five ingredients. Process until dough forms a ball. In small bowl, mix the crumbs and lemon juice. Roll dough into 1″ balls and coat with crumbs. Store in an airtight container for up to two weeks. Makes 4 balls. Nutritional info per ball: 240 calories; 54g carbohydrates; 2.5g fat; 5.5g protein Dried fruit provides the bulk of the carbohydrates and calories in the bites. Because it contains a significant amount of fiber (more than 8 grams per serving), they are best eaten before and during sports that do not stimulate the gastrointestinal tract. These sports would include cycling, swimming, and hiking.

They may not settle in your stomach if you’re going to participate in high-impact types of activities such as running or aerobics. So in order to keep it all in, these would not be a good idea when participating in a triathelon!

Recommended Reading:
Surviving a Wilderness Emergency
Smart Cookies: 80 Recipes for Heavenly, Healthful Snacking (Jane Kinderlehrer Smart Food Series)
Cooking the One Burner Way, 2nd (Cookbooks)

For more related SurvivalCommonSense.com tips and stories, click on the highlighted words:

• STOP: Use this exercise to reduce stress and focus your thoughts.
• Write a note to let people know where you went, before you left.

• Take your Ten Essentials on every outing.
• Dress with the right fabrics.
• Have a plan to make a tarp shelter.
• Carry lightweight, compact firestarter.
• Find the most effective fire ignition system.
• How to make charcloth, a material that can catch a spark from any source.
• Use charcloth as an effective method of catching a spark to make a fire.
• It can kill you: Hypothermia
• Hardtack: A great emergency food
  
• About Leon Pantenburg

by Leon Pantenburg

Looking for a way to use up surplus flour, or make a cheap trail food or durable survival ration? One answer may be hardtack, a baked, unleavened wheat cracker. As a survival food, hardtack has a proven track record.

Three Confederate soldiers captured after the battle of Gettysburg. Hardtack was a standard ration for both armies.

Vicksburg, MS: My gray-clad brothers-in-arms and I  hunkered down for dinner. In the morning, we would do battle with those “heathen Yankee horde” Civil War re-enactors at Champions Hill, between Jackson and Vicksburg , Mississippi.

I was “under cover” on assignment for the Vicksburg Post to photograph the battle, one of the biggest re-enactments of the year. Except for the Nikon safely hidden  in my haversack, my gear, weapons and accouterments were authentic in every way.

Since I was working for the post, I had to represent the home team and be a Confederate. (This probably caused a minor earth tremor in Iowa as my great-great-grandfather, James Hallowell,  97th Illinois Infantry, rolled in his grave!) My excuse was that I was drafted,  like most Confederate soldiers, and had no choice!

I ‘d learned a lot about being a Civil War infantryman in one short, sweltering afternoon: the wool uniforms were too hot, and felt like you were wearing a sweatsuit: the wool Kepi-style caps provided no sun protection and the canteens were too small. The Sargent, sensing my disillusionment with the Confederate cause (and knowing he had an embedded journalist in the unit), picked on me, said I was a slacker, and called me a baboon when I dropped my canteen during drill. As darkness fell, we would sleep under wool blankets, not to stay warm, but to fight off mosquitoes all night.

But the food was the worst. Dinner was a piece of hardtack, a fatty piece of bacon toasted on a bayonet over a campfire;  horrible boiled coffee brewed in my tin cup and a wormy-looking apple. After eating my meager meal, I was ready to either desert or form a raiding party to attack  the Yankees and get some real food!

Hardtack is easy to make, has a long shelf life, and all the flavor and texture of a fired brick!

Hardtack is one of the original trail and emergency foods, and it is worth considering if you are a prepper or are interested in wilderness or urban survival. The advantage is that hardtack is easy to make, transports easily and will last a reasonably long time if stored in plastic bags or containers. The disadvantage is the bland taste, and traditional toughness.

Even after yeast was discovered by the Egyptians, there was a purpose for unleavened breads. It was easy to carry and

durable, so it was standard fare for hunters and warriors.  Centuries later, Christopher Columbus took unleavened bread on his journeys.

Hardtack remained a staple in the New World. During the early settlement of North America, the exploration of the continent, the American Revolution, and on through the American Civil War, armies were kept alive with hardtack.  A basic concept in war is that the side that keeps its soldiers from going hungry will probably win.

Hardtack is also reasonably nutritious. Wheat flour is more than 10% protein and includes Vitamin B. During emergencies, people can live for quite a while on just bread and water.  Although raw flour is hard to digest, in the form of hard bread, it is edible.

No one has determined just when, or how, during the American Civil War, hard bread began to be referred to as hardtack. Apparently,  it was first called hardtack by the Union Army of the Potomac; although the name spread to other units, it was generally referred to as hard bread by the armies of the West.

Petersburg, Va. Officers of the 114th Pennsylvania Infantry playing cards in front of tents

Regardless of the time frame, if you’re a history buff, prepper or hard core survivalist, you should consider including hardtack in your emergency food supplies or survival kit. A guaranteed conversation starter at any campfire, campout or outdoor event, hardtack can have a useful place  in today’s survival kit.

(It only takes a few additional ingredients to turbocharge  the nutritional value of hardtack. To each cup of flour in the recipe, add one tablespoon of soy flour, one teaspoon of wheat germ and one teaspoon of powdered milk. There is no difference in the taste, and these ingredients combine to make the bread a complete protein.)

There are many versions and varities of hardtack recipes: Try some of these to start out.

Ingredients:

• 4 cups flour (preferably whole wheat)
• 4 teaspoons salt
• Water (about 2 cups)
• Pre-heat oven to 375° F
• Makes about 10 pieces

Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl. Add just enough water (less than two cups) so that the mixture will stick together, producing a dough that won’t stick to hands, rolling pin or pan.  Mix the dough by hand. Roll the dough out, shaping it roughly into a rectangle. Cut into the dough into squares about 3 x 3 inches and ½ inch thick.

After cutting the squares, press a pattern of four rows of four holes into each square, using a nail or other such object. Do not punch through the dough.  The appearance you want is similar to that of a modern saltine cracker.  Turn each square over and do the same thing to the other side.

Place the squares on an ungreased cookie sheet in the oven and bake for 30 minutes. Turn each piece over and bake for another 30 minutes. The crackers should be slightly brown on both sides.

The fresh crackers are easily broken, but as they dry, they harden and assume the consistency of fired brick.

Swedish Hardtack

• 1 cup water
• 3 tbsp. vegetable oil
• 3 tbsp. honey
• 3 cups rye flour (or 1 1/2 cups rye & 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour)
• 1  1/2 tbsp. brewer’s yeast (optional)
• 1/4 tsp. salt

Mix liquids together.  In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients.  Combine the mixtures, stirring to moisten throughout.  Form a ball.  On a floured surface, flatten the dough, and roll out thinly. Cut into squares and prick each cracker with the tines of a fork a couple of times.  Transfer to lightly greased baking sheets. Bake at 425° F for around 8 minutes, checking to be sure not to over-brown.  It is best served warm.

Mix: two cups of all-purpose flour and a half teaspoon of salt.  Use more salt for authenticity. Mix by hand. Add a teaspoon of shortening and a half cup of water, stirred in a little at a time to form a very stiff dough.  Beat the dough to a half inch thickness with a clean top mallet or rifle butt.  Fold the sheet of dough into six layers. Continue to beat and to fold the dough a half dozen times until it is elastic. Roll the dough out to a half-inch thickness before cutting it with a floured biscuit cutter or bayonet. Bake for about a half hour in a 325° F oven.

The basic ingredients are flour, salt and water. General directions are also similar: Dissolve the salt in water and work it into flour using your hands.  The dough should be firm and pliable but not sticky or dry. Flatten the dough onto a cookie sheet to about 1/4 inch thick, and cut into squares 3 inches by 3 inches.  Pierce each square with 16 holes about ½ inch apart.  Bake in oven until edges are brown or dough is hard.

Preheat the oven to 400° F For each cup of flour add 1 teaspoon of salt. Mix salt and flour with just enough water to bind. Bake 20-25 minutes.  The longer you bake the hardtack, the more authentic it will appear.

A Sailor’s Diet

• 2 1/2 cups old-fashioned or quick oats.
• 3 cups unbleached flour.
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt.
• 1 teaspoon baking soda.

In a separate container, mix:

• 1 1/2 cups buttermilk.
• 3 tablespoons honey.
• 1/2 cup melted bacon drippings or shortening.

Combine the two sets of ingredients. When the dough is thoroughly mixed, roll it out on a floured board to a thickness of about a quarter inch.  Cut out circles of dough with a large drinking glass dipped in flour and put them on a lightly greased cookie sheet.  Bake for about 5 1/2 minutes at 450° F. 

Let the hardtack cool on a wire rack before serving with jam or jelly.

By Leon Pantenburg

When my son Dan moved to his first apartment, it seemed like my parental duty to provide him with an “urban survival kit” that included some basic kitchen tools. These necessities included several good “survival manuals” (cookbooks)
some sharp kitchen “survival knives” and a well-seasoned cast iron Dutch oven.

Dan’s urban “survival training” came from Boy Scout Troop 18 in Bend, Oregon. He, along with most of his buddies, earned the cooking merit badge. The requirements included learning how to cook outdoors over a campfire, using aluminum foil or a cast iron Dutch oven,

Dan’s oven is a cast-iron, 10-inch Lodge-brand oven that can be used both indoors and outside. It is the same brand, make, model and size of oven I have used at least weekly for nearly 30 years. When I bought my new oven, it seemed expensive.Lodge Logic Pre-Seasoned Cast Iron 4-Quart Dutch Oven with Iron Cover

But Dan’s oven was free because it was slightly rusty and dirty from being stored in an old garage for years. A little elbow grease restored the cast iron to like-new condition.

If you’re a recycler (like many preppers  and survivalists are) and you frequent garage sales and thrift stores, then keep an eye out for good, useful cast-iron cooking implements. Somebody’s rusty, dust-covered survivor of a failed camping trip may end up becoming a valuable addition to your cooking tools.

In a survival situation, a Dutch oven is a useful tool for baking, boiling, sautéing or frying. You can use virtually any

After: Dan's seasoned cast iron Dutch oven is ready to be cooked in.

heat source, including a campfire, charcoal, a propane burner or  barbecue grill. And talk about something with barter or trade value – a few days without electricity, and everyone will be clamoring for a Dutch oven.

You can also save money. Just keep a list of the cast iron items you need or want when you go garage sale-ing, because you never know when a treasure will pop up.

If you don’t need any more cast iron, you can always upgrade what you have, or buy duplicates. Re-seasoned cast iron also makes a great, unique gift that will be used and appreciated for years. Nobody re-gifts a good cast iron Dutch oven!

My Dad, sister Karla, brother Mike and I all collect cast iron, and the older and more obscure the brand, the better. In our informal competition, the only rule is that cast iron can only be acquired using fair chase methods. That means no eBay, or advertising. A special find or acquisition is always good for a flurry of emails!

But aside from the fun of searching and looking, cast iron implements are heirloom tools you can use regularly. And cast iron, combined with a little knowledge, can be used both indoors and outside, making a cast iron Dutch oven a multi-purpose survival tool.

When properly seasoned, cast iron can be virtually nonstick. The even heating and heat-retaining ability make cast iron a good choice for frying, searing, baking and cooking stews, gumbos and soups.

But buy quality pieces, because your cast-iron cookware can be with you for generations. I still regularly use the skillet my grandmother reportedly got in 1918 as a wedding present. My Mom got it in 1950 and used it for decades, until the skillet got passed along to me. Today, grandma’s skillet is good for at least a few more generations of regular use! Lodge Logic 10-Inch Chef’s Skillet

My daughter, Mary, already has dibs on an 80-year old, 6-inch skillet she cooks eggs in. And Dad’s old oblong cast iron Dutch oven that he used back in the 1960s is still in fine shape and could be used at the family reunion this year in Colorado.

This pile of rusty cast iron could yield a great vintage cooking implement.

When it comes to quality, experts know that some experienced iron may be superior to what’s on the store shelves. But a potential buyer of used cast iron had better beware. A cheap piece of cast junk is never a good deal, because it will end up being replaced at some point.

Although I own several different brands of cast iron implements, I prefer Lodge cast iron for competition cooking because of the uniform quality. It’s also the only cast iron made the USA. All the iron ore used for casting at the Lodge foundry goes through a Geiger counter screening before being used. The cast iron made overseas has no such requirement that I’m aware of.

Before buying any used piece, look it over carefully. Dirt, dust and light rust are generally not a problem, but deep rust pitting might be. If the piece has been painted or had motor oil in it, or has any cracks, pinholes, warps, scratches or signs of abuse, don’t buy it.

Then check the quality of the casting. Look for uniform thickness in the sides, bottom and lid, because variances in thickness could cause hot or cold spots. Make sure lids fit tightly, with no gaps or rocking. A properly-fitted lid forms a seal that creates pressure while cooking and helps retain moisture.

Once you buy a used piece, it will probably need to be seasoned. Seasoning is the black patina that protects the metal and makes it nonstick. If the seasoning looks even, with no flaking or rust spots, then a good cleaning may be all that is needed before using.

But most likely, you’ll have to re-season, and there are different ways to accomplish that. My brother, Michael Pantenburg, salvaged a badly-mistreated oven by soaking the cast iron overnight in regular Coca Cola, then scrubbing it with a steel wool pad. When he was done, the cast iron looked brand new.

An antique gumbo pot my Dad got at a farm sale decades ago was severely rusted. I took a crack at cleaning it with steel wool, but gave up. It was used to haul ashes from my fireplace for a while. Then, I took it to an auto body shop and had it sandblasted for $5. Once it was re-seasoned, the pot went back to work. When my mother-in-law visits from Mississippi, she uses it to make seafood gumbo.

Avoid cooking any tomato or bean products in a newly seasoned cast iron for the first few times, because the acid will

After brushing or the dust or dirt, remove the rust and old patina with a steel wool pad.

remove the seasoning. After that, use your new, experienced cast iron whenever possible. The more you use it, the more seasoned it gets and the better it will work.

How to season cast iron

The Central Oregon Dutch Oven Society recommends this seasoning method:

Scrub off any dirt or dust. A stiff fiber or wire brush works well for this initial cleaning.

Remove the old seasoning so bare metal is visible. Start by rubbing the iron with steel wool. If necessary, use light sandpaper. In extreme cases, take a particularly challenging piece to an auto body shop and have it sandblasted.

Once you get to shiny metal, wash and dry the piece. Then lightly coat the surface with vegetable oil so it is shiny but the oil doesn’t puddle. I prefer solid shortening for seasoning, but there are also commercial products available.

When the cast iron is clean and polished, coat the surface with shortening. Only use enough to make the cast iron look wet.

Place the cast iron in a 350-degree oven and bake for about an hour. This is going to be smelly and smoky, so if you have a gas grill, do this outside. Put the piece upside down on the grill and lower the hood. Shut off the heat when the smoke stops, and let the grill and cast iron cool completely. This technique can be repeated until you get the preferred shade of black and level of nonstick.

Re-seasoning can be done whenever you feel like doing it. I periodically re-season some the scout troop’s Dutch ovens,  just because I like them to look really black and shiny. And they look really cool when we stack them!

(Leon Pantenburg is a charter member of the Central Oregon Dutch Oven Society, competitive Dutch oven cook and two-time finalist in the International Dutch Oven Society’s World Championship cookoff. He teaches the Boy Scout cooking merit badge, and is a freelance writer, who loves to expound on outdoor cooking.)

Dutch oven info on the Web:

For more information on cast-iron cooking, contact the International Dutch Oven Society:

www.idos.com

Interesting and useful Dutch oven cooking items and cookbooks:

http://www.dutchovenstuff.com/

Lodge cast iron: http://www.lodgemfg.com/

      by Leon Pantenburg

 The only item on the lunch menu the first day was a three-inch square of Hudson Bay Bread gobbed with about two tablespoons of peanut butter. I’d worked up quite an appetite paddling and portaging that morning, and privately wondered where I’d get the energy to last the rest of the day.

My oldest son, Dan, and I, along with seven other members of Boy Scout Troop 18 of Bend, Oregon, had just started on a nine-day canoe trip through the Boundary Waters in northern Minnesota. We left from the Boy Scouts Northern Tier High Adventure base at Ely, Minn., and all the food, cooking gear and a guide were supplied.

To my surprise, the Hudson Bay bread was so rich, filling and full of calories that I could barely finish it. I had ample energy to paddle, portage and hike until that evening. There’s no question that the folks at the High Adventure base know how to fuel hungry paddlers!

Since that canoe journey in 2004, Hudson Bay bread has been put on my short list for high-energy, low-weight outdoor activity fuel. But being a freelance food writer, as well as somewhat of a health nut, I tweaked the recipe to make it a healthier food item.

Regardless of the recipe, one way to use the bread is to cut it into three-inch squares and put it into individual sandwich bags. For convenience, get peanut butter in one-ounce packets or fruit jam, and use that as a topping.

 I assume the bread would last for several months, but don’t really know since it gets eaten too soon to find out!

Here’s the recipe for the bread given out by the High Adventure base at Ely. My suggestions for substitutions may change the flavor somewhat, but you’ll still get the nutritional punch needed for hiking, biking or any activity that burns a lot of calories.

HUDSON BAY BREAD

1-1/2 lbs. margarine or butter (Butter, always!)

4 cups of sugar (substitute raw, unrefined evaporated cane sugar)

2/3 cup Karo syrup (use maple syrup or blackstrap molasses. Get rid of the empty calorie refined corn syrup and add extra iron with molasses.)

2/3 cup honey

2 tsp. maple flavoring (If you use pure maple syrup, you don’t need this artifical additive.)

Cream together the above ingredients.

Add while mixing:

1-1/2 cups of ground nuts (Almonds can supply additional potassium)

19 cups of oatmeal (use steel cut or the kind you have to cook. The less refined the grain, the more nutrition).

 Spread in a large sheet pan. Press it down into the pan. Bake at 325 degrees in a wind (or convection) oven for 15-18 minutes. As soon as the bread has been taken from the oven, use a spatula to press it down again. This presses the bread together to keep it from crumbling.

Cut it while still warm. For home-size preparation, cut this recipe at least in half. A conventional oven requires a longer baking time.