Pemmican

y0u · Pemmican

Anyone have a link or recipe for making pemmican?

Dean

y0u and I are both gonna need this.

Here's one link.

http://www.lns.cornell.edu/~seb/pemmican.html

I've got dried bison in my freezer that is all pulverized and ready to mix with tallow. I've gotta figure out the best ratio of fat to meat.

I can tell y0u the way I made it.

First I got some bison round steak from a meat processor and sliced very thin slices. If y0u can get bison or beef round at a meat counter or processor, make sure to have them slice it for y0u. That'll save y0u lots of time.

Next, I put these thin slices of meat in a dehydrator. I tried the oven, but the temps are too high, even at the lowest setting, and the meat just burned. In the dehydrator on the lowest setting (or y0u can use a Nuwave, I've heard), the meat will dry but won't burn.

After y0u have your dried meat strips y0u can start to grind them. First, use a food processor and grind them as much as possible. After that y0u will have to use like a coffee grinder to pulverize what y0u have. I did all this in stages, by storing the dried meat in the freezer. Another thing y0u can do is dry a bunch of different berries to grind with the coffee grinder and mix in with the meat. Sweet beat meat is what the natives used to call this stuff.

I used a flour sifter, different strainers, and just kept grinding and grinding until I got the consistency of powdered sugar. I now have a huge bag of this wonderful stuff in my freezer, ready to mix with tallow. Haven't done it yet, which just blows my mind, since I've had it for so long, but have yet to make pemmican.

Will y0u be my pemmican buddy and encourage me to make this stuff finally?! Roll Eyes

y0u

Wow Dean..that's a LOT of info, thank you so much. I am into making pemmican, absolutely.!! I gave my dehydrator away to my SIL, hopefully she still has it, and I can borrow it. As soon as I see some very lean beef on sale I will buy it and dry it up.

Do you think it matters if I don't use suet? I don't think I can get suet very easily, just regular beef fat. And I don't think I would be adding berries to it at this point. I have not eaten any fruit in over 5 months. I would however be adding dry spices to it. What are you planning to add to yours?

I can't believe you have all the stuff already and you haven't made it yet.

Pretty soon we'll be swillin wine and eating pemmican in the back of the bus!

y0u rock..my pemmican buddy!!

Dean

So... last night I FINALLY got around to making some of this stuff!

I had this dried sweet beat meat in my freezer for such a LONG time!

So, I heated up some tallow and measured equal amounts of powdered meat and liquid gold in a pyrex measuring cup.

First I put some meat into a glass pan, and then I slowly poured in the liquid tallow, stirring it all up into a gooey paste that I then smeared all over the bottom of the glass pan, about a half inch thick.

I put the glass pan into the fridge, and, this morning, I took it out and cut some small pieces out of the pan. It was hard, as tallow usually is, even at room temperature. I ended up with some flat pieces that resembled chocolate bars or pieces of fudge. They tasted OK, but, I can see why most people who make "pemmican" end up adding things like honey, raisins, nuts, and such, cuz, this stuff is rather bland tasting. And, I had lots of different dried berries in my meat, although, I suppose I could have had more.

It is interesting stuff. Sorta gritty after you dissolve it in your mouth, since, after all, it's just tallow and dried meat. LOL

Anyway, I doubt I'll ever spend all the time to make this stuff again, but, at least now I can say I did make some bison pemmican. Yup

y0u

Dean, thanks for sharing your results. I think when I make it I will indeed make a small batch, and add all sorts of herbs to it for flavor, and skip the berries.

I must admit that I wish you had said it was really good and exciting. But now I know not to make 5 pounds of the stuff. Grin