How To Make Pemmican

Pemmican is a method of preserving meat or fish for long periods of time without refrigeration. Pemmican is made out of dried meat, rendered fat, and berries. The berries are optional, but add flavor and carbs. However they may reduce the storage time as well.

To make Pemmican cut off all fat from your meat. Next slice the meat as thinly as possible. Now hang the meat on racks to dry in the full sun. In humid areas or anywhere actually, you can use an oven at really low temperature to dry the meat.

The meat is only ready when you can take a piece of the meat strips and have it crack when you bend it. This is a way of testing to be sure that the moisture content of the meat has dropped sufficiently.

Now grind the meat into a powder if possible or more likely into the very thin fibers. The type of meat will determine this. Fish will be easily reduced into powder... deer meat, not so much. A flat rock and a roundish rock can be used for this step. If you are unable to grind the meat properly, then dry it some more. Salt can be added to the meat at this point if you have salt available. It isn't necessary, but adding salt extends the time that the meat can be stored. If you are adding fruit, the fruit should be dried in the same manner as the meat and added to the powdered meat.

The next step is suet, which is basically melted animal fat. However, not all fat is created equal. Do not use fat most associated with muscle. You want the kidney or belly fat that you find most abundantly in the interior cavity of the animal. It will be hard fat. You do not want to use the soft jello like fat.

Cut the fat into small pieces. How small? The smaller the better! Heat the fat in a pot. Do not get the fat too hot, you do not want to cook the fat. If done in an oven 170F is fine, lower is better. You want a low heat not a regular cooking temp heat. Keep the fat on a low heat/fire for several hours stirring occasionally until the fat in the pot has stopped bubbling. Now filter the fat to remove any chunks.

Add about one part of fat or a bit more too two parts of meat by pouring the still warm liquefied fat over the meat while mixing. Add your dried berries if you like. Mix well; everything needs to be well blended.

Let the pemmican firm up and then cut into chunks for storage. Store the pemmican in a cool dry space.

How long the pemmican lasts greatly depends on how it is stored and if salt was added or not. Potentially it can last for more than a year if salt was added. Refrigeration will obviously allow it to last a really long time as well.

To maximize storage time store the pemmican in airtight containers.