Hard Tack

Going on a long sea voyage anytime soon? Needing a little more realism in your monthly civil war reenactments? Want to show your students how life was hard?

Then whip up a batch of hard tack. From Wikipedia:

Hardtack (or hard tack) is a simple type of cracker or biscuit, made from flour, water, and sometimes salt. Inexpensive and long-lasting, it was and is used for sustenance in the absence of perishable foods, commonly during long sea voyages and military campaigns.[1] The name derives from the British sailor slang for food, "tack". It is known by other names such as pilot bread (as rations for ship's pilots[2]), ship's biscuit, shipbiscuit, sea biscuit, sea bread (as rations for sailors) or pejoratively "dog biscuits," "tooth dullers," "sheet iron," "worm castles" or "molar breakers".[3] Australian military personnel know them as ANZAC wafers.

Step 1: Ingredients

You don't need much to make some hard tack

2 c. whole wheat flour
1 c. Water
1 tsp salt
1 nail (clean of course!)

Comments

[Misac-kun]

I made some at home and man, this things is as hard as wood.

[dim20]

is hardtack,hard? i mean is it like a cracker or something that would break your teeth.
please awenser xD

[Didymus_James]

I just made a batch for survival. If you add crushed multivitamins to the base, it can be hugely more nutritious (as in enough to sustain on). I also added a splash of vanilla extract and about 1/4 C. of sugar for flavor. I'll post another comment to tell you all how it was :).

[Trike Lover]

C.S. Forester, in one of the "Hornblower" novels, claims that ship's biscuit was "baked twice". The context of that remark is that Hornblower's ship is careened on a remote Pacific island, having shot holes and masts repaired and preparing new stores after taking severe damage in a fight with an enemy ship. The remark, as nearly as I can remember it, is, "Hornblower, although Captain, came into his own as the only person who knew the proper method of preparing ship's biscuit, An oven was built on on shore and the biscuit twice-baked to ensure it would remain good even on the long voyage home."

I believe the particular novel was, "The Happy Return". Forester also refers on several occasions to ship's biscuit as being "hard as flint" - no doubt not far from the truth. Since he also routinely describes officers and crew "absent-mindedly tapping their biscuit to drive the weevils out", "good" would be a relative term when describing it :-)

[TheREAL_Xman]

Wow! Great Instructable! My crackers turned out not as even as yours and burnt, but still a fun process! I added some lemon juice to the mix to give just a bit Vitamin C to the cracker.

Thanks

[jacepouncey]

if you want authentic hardtack, then add sawdust and iron filings. im not kidding, they really added that to it back in the day

[hi111]

Cool but diskusting...

[Javin007]

I've never read that iron filings were ACTUALLY added (particularly since there's a very high likelihood that they would become embedded in your stomach/intestine, you'd become septic, and this would kill you). However, that was a running joke among both sailors, and soldiers. Because of how hard and flavorless the biscuits were, the joke went along the lines of:

"Hey, Cookie, settle a bet for me. Joe says you use two cups of sawdust, and two cups of iron filings for the hardtack. I say you use three."

This said, sawdust has often been added to foods to "bulk" them up when times were hard.  While I've not actually read of provable accounts of civil war soldiers (my parents were big into reenacting, so I got an education whether I wanted it or not) having hardtack with sawdust added, many letters home would complain about the hardtack *saying* it had been cut with sawdust.  This could have been them just complaining about the flavor, or it could have easily been literal (particularly on the confederate side).  Indeed, the Confederate Johnnycake would start looking more and more like hardtack as the war waged on, with less fat, less cornmeal, and more wheat flour added as time went on.  I'd be more surprised to find out that sawdust never WAS used for hardtack.

During the great depression, there were even "sawdust soups" that were made when things got really bad.  

Considering the corners that ship's owners (not to be confused with the captains) would cut when sending a ship out, I wouldn't be even a little bit surprised to find that they purchased sawdust "bulked" hardtack to supply the ships with, as if the hardtack itself wasn't cheap enough.  Indeed, it was known for *years* that a little lemon juice would keep the men from getting scurvy, but due to the cheapness of the ship's owners, it would be quite a while before they started adding it to the rum rations to prevent it. 

Man, I have way too much time on my hands...

[Didymus_James]

By the by, would you happen to know the shelf life of said hardtack? The 'able says "long" but how long is that? years? decades?

[aseaheru]

and then theres the royal navy verson....
and you do see alot about sawdust bread in autobiographys

[jackq7a]

I have no doubt that they added sawdust to original hard tack. It's added to foods these days and called cellulose.

[Javin007]

*heh heh* Don't even get me STARTED on all the crap that's added to foods now days. I think 100 years from now we will be looking back saying, "What the F*@$! were they THINKING?"

[dragonrose]

Went to a Civil War reenactment & submitted Hardtack ala mode for the baking contest. Came in 2nd.

[Javin007]

LMAO @ Hardtack ala mode.

That just seems like two worlds colliding.  I love it!

[Hellspore]

Hardtack, cooked is enjoyable also, break it into bite size chunks, soak it in water 30 min or so, and fry it up with a slice of bacon or fatback like the soldiers in the Civil war did, this was called Gilly and was part of their main daily food rations.

[Javin007]

Mmmmmm... Fatback...

[amaineman57]

the name of hard tack broken up and fried in the grease of the salt pork ration was "skillygalley" (sp) If same was done with Confederate rough cornmeal it was called "cush"

[bowow0807]

i doubt that this will break my teeth i chew hard candy like gum and bit a shard off a jaw breaker

[minimidget]

You probably still shouldn't risk it...

Just because you've gotten away with being careless with your teeth before doesn't mean that'll always be the case.

[Javin007]

Aw let him try it. If he don't hurt himself, he won't learn nothin'.

[bowow0807]

made some hard tack and let it "age" a bit and still have all my teeth, pretty good once you have it moist after the first couple of chews

[jramirez23]

could be used for ZA

[Javin007]

:D The PAW?

[mcaliber.50]

they used to soak these in rum mixed with fruit, and they would ea tthat. also helped prevent scyrvy, becuse they used orandges, limes, lemons, ect

[aseaheru]

spellcheck?

[mcaliber.50]

my computer doesn't have an auto spellcheck feature

[aseaheru]

neather douse mine [ is mad about inabilaty of self to spell dose]

[KittyF]

you're trying for "does". I made that mistake once and my fingers are dyslexic so i do it often when I'm typing to fast. LOL

[aseaheru]

Thanks. i have a verry od thing that one finger goes before the other now...................

[KittyF]

LOL yeah, me too. I call it dyslexic fingers. my head knows what I want, but my fingers do their own thing. I do have spell check, but that doesn't help when they've managed to actually SPELL a WORD. just not the one I wanted.

[aseaheru]

exactly. maby its our subconchinse talking......... I NEED A SPELLCHECK BUILT INTO MY BRAIN!

[zac_9687]

anyone else think its kind of odd that there is a HUGE discussion about spellcheck and spelling errors in an instructable about hardtack? i just thought that was kinda funny lol. carry on

[h8864]

itsw weird but it happens

[aseaheru]

its excedingly funny because i think that this is the longest chain of comments ive seen.

[h8864]

and now its longer


CONTINUE THE CHAIN!!!!

[aseaheru]

please do.

[KittyF]

LOL now we're getting silly

[h8864]

no were not

[aseaheru]

whaqts silly?

[KittyF]

trying to extend this thread with inane comments and questions, of course. LOL