The Pemicake Preserve (make a pemican bundle)
If you dont have vacuum seal jars to store meat( I dont advocate freezing meat for numerous reasons), one could make a Pemicake Preserve to store the tallow and meat.
This method takes the dried meat of game and mixes it with the marrow and tallow. The advantage of this method is that one does not need electricity, freezing temperatures, or plastic to store the meat and precious oils of the game. The pemicake preserve can be easily packed and transported for a highly nutritious and energy dense food source.
Dry the meat and pound it into a powder. The best cuts are recommend to source your meat. The back strap has the least sinew which makes pounding to powder easier, results is less sinew in the final product, and preserves the sinew dense jerky meats in other ways so the collagen fibers can first be cooked to derive the most nutrition from the animal, or saved to make and use as cordage.
A useful method for pounding the meat is use a large wooden morter and pestle, as was done by native tribes. You can also use a large stone mortar and pestle but this will take longer. Don't use a food processor or it will break.
I often use the cavity fat for pemican. The body fat I dry, cut up, vacuum seal in jars, and store in a cool dark place or render and store in jars for consumption. The body fat is primarily oily, and makes a great tasting meal with dried meat. So chop the cavity fat and render. You can also "chew the fat", to break up the fat cell walls, while butchering and put it into a jar or other rendering vessel; though this method is less sanitary.
This method takes the dried meat of game and mixes it with the marrow and tallow. The advantage of this method is that one does not need electricity, freezing temperatures, or plastic to store the meat and precious oils of the game. The pemicake preserve can be easily packed and transported for a highly nutritious and energy dense food source.
Dry the meat and pound it into a powder. The best cuts are recommend to source your meat. The back strap has the least sinew which makes pounding to powder easier, results is less sinew in the final product, and preserves the sinew dense jerky meats in other ways so the collagen fibers can first be cooked to derive the most nutrition from the animal, or saved to make and use as cordage.
A useful method for pounding the meat is use a large wooden morter and pestle, as was done by native tribes. You can also use a large stone mortar and pestle but this will take longer. Don't use a food processor or it will break.
I often use the cavity fat for pemican. The body fat I dry, cut up, vacuum seal in jars, and store in a cool dark place or render and store in jars for consumption. The body fat is primarily oily, and makes a great tasting meal with dried meat. So chop the cavity fat and render. You can also "chew the fat", to break up the fat cell walls, while butchering and put it into a jar or other rendering vessel; though this method is less sanitary.
Curently, i find the best way to render is on a stove top, low temperature, scim as soon as the fat is clear and free from the fat cells.
Break the bones open, and chop the marrow into little bits. Place bones and marrow in jars and slow cook in the oven; again, skimming the delicate oils as soon as they render.
I say to use glass jars in the oven as this makes the healthiest food without a metalic taste. Clay pots works well too. Slow cook (270) for about three hours should render most of the marrow without burning it.
Once you have the rendered marrow, rendered tallow, and dried meat, you will need a raw hide cover to wrap your final product. You could use vacuum seal jars, but the raw hide cover can be sourced in the bush, it wont shatter if dropped, in the case of say potentially using plastic bags, the hide wont leach chemicals into your food or harbour dangerous aerobic organisms. The reason one needs the cover, is to protect the pemicake ingredients from oxidation and degradation, as well as hold it together and keep the food clean. In the hide, oxidation will still occur, so it wont last forever. Aim to eat in a month.
Scrape the hair from the deer hide and cut some thongs or prepare some strong sinew strands.
If you have the liver (which can be dried too), you can add it, dried, to the pounded meat for the important vitamins it will add to the product; heck, any organ can be added. Hold back on the lung though.
Mix the dried meat with the collected rendered marrow and tallows. Aim for 1:1 or as long as the product is not crumbling once it is cooled.
Once the cake has been made and cooled, take an appropriate size of already wet, or raw hide (hair scraped off) and stretch it around the cake. Take a cut long thong and sew the sides shut. Make the overlap stiches broad so when dry the whole package will shrink tight. Once wrapped, wet skin held in place with the sinew or thongs, and all surface areas of pemican are covered, dry in front of a fan for a couple days or hang in a breezy place. The moisture will evaporate leaving a hard, tight, rawhide shell over your food. If dried properly, mould wont be a problem. The moisture must leave fully or when you crack it open there will be off colours and a slight fish-skin smell on the surface - all pretty much harmless unless left for a longer time than the whole package should be stored (two months?) The Pemicake Preserve is ready to be cooled in a fridge for storage or other very cool, dry, dark location.
In parctice, apparently, once fully dried, if the shell and seems are heavily greased, the content should last; but this would only prolong shelf life slightly.
Pemican is not a product that lasts 10 years - contrary to historical accounts or people who say otherwise reg. storage in raw hides or parfletchs. All ingredients, including the deep areas of the cake degrade/oxidize when exposed to even small amounts of air, light, and/or moisture - over time. Vac sealed, packed in a jar stores it best; but, tightly wrapped in a hide as instructed will work well for the fully-self-reliant-not-carrying-mason-jars-into-the-deep-bush types who plan to eat it in less than a couple months.
Break the bones open, and chop the marrow into little bits. Place bones and marrow in jars and slow cook in the oven; again, skimming the delicate oils as soon as they render.
I say to use glass jars in the oven as this makes the healthiest food without a metalic taste. Clay pots works well too. Slow cook (270) for about three hours should render most of the marrow without burning it.
Once you have the rendered marrow, rendered tallow, and dried meat, you will need a raw hide cover to wrap your final product. You could use vacuum seal jars, but the raw hide cover can be sourced in the bush, it wont shatter if dropped, in the case of say potentially using plastic bags, the hide wont leach chemicals into your food or harbour dangerous aerobic organisms. The reason one needs the cover, is to protect the pemicake ingredients from oxidation and degradation, as well as hold it together and keep the food clean. In the hide, oxidation will still occur, so it wont last forever. Aim to eat in a month.
Scrape the hair from the deer hide and cut some thongs or prepare some strong sinew strands.
If you have the liver (which can be dried too), you can add it, dried, to the pounded meat for the important vitamins it will add to the product; heck, any organ can be added. Hold back on the lung though.
Mix the dried meat with the collected rendered marrow and tallows. Aim for 1:1 or as long as the product is not crumbling once it is cooled.
Once the cake has been made and cooled, take an appropriate size of already wet, or raw hide (hair scraped off) and stretch it around the cake. Take a cut long thong and sew the sides shut. Make the overlap stiches broad so when dry the whole package will shrink tight. Once wrapped, wet skin held in place with the sinew or thongs, and all surface areas of pemican are covered, dry in front of a fan for a couple days or hang in a breezy place. The moisture will evaporate leaving a hard, tight, rawhide shell over your food. If dried properly, mould wont be a problem. The moisture must leave fully or when you crack it open there will be off colours and a slight fish-skin smell on the surface - all pretty much harmless unless left for a longer time than the whole package should be stored (two months?) The Pemicake Preserve is ready to be cooled in a fridge for storage or other very cool, dry, dark location.
In parctice, apparently, once fully dried, if the shell and seems are heavily greased, the content should last; but this would only prolong shelf life slightly.
Pemican is not a product that lasts 10 years - contrary to historical accounts or people who say otherwise reg. storage in raw hides or parfletchs. All ingredients, including the deep areas of the cake degrade/oxidize when exposed to even small amounts of air, light, and/or moisture - over time. Vac sealed, packed in a jar stores it best; but, tightly wrapped in a hide as instructed will work well for the fully-self-reliant-not-carrying-mason-jars-into-the-deep-bush types who plan to eat it in less than a couple months.
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| Sew the raw hide around the pemicake. |
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| Dried pemicake with dried rawhide wrap. |
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| After a few wet and then dry applications of hide glue. This is not air tight or a last-forever condition. |
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