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"Simple Biscuits" also called hard biscuits, ship's biscuits, sea biscuits, tack biscuits and by the civil war "Hard Tack," were a staple of journeymen and travelers all through the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. They were a simple staple which kept for weeks or months depending on the method of drying and were more akin to a cracker than to the modern buttery, flakey biscuits that we know and love today.
Simple Biscuit (hard tack) Recipe
Where many people go wrong when making "Hard Tack" these days is they are using only modern unbleached flour.
In the old days, "Simple Biscuits" also called Sea Biscuits or Hard Tack, were made using a lower quality flour sometimes called floss or groat, this low quality flour consisted of the bran, hull and germ of many different grains, and included about 80% actual flower.
The remaining 20% were water resistant "grain solids" which helped to bind the dry biscuits together as well as preserve them. Today we can replicate this early flower with much success by mixing multi grain hot cereals with all purpose flour.
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Preheat your oven to 375 F
4 cups of flour
1 cup of Bob's Red Mill Org High Fiber Hot Cereal w/ Flaxseed
5 teaspoons of salt
Just enough water to bind it all together into a slightly sticky dough
(2 cups or so)
Keep your hands wet to handle the dough, do not knead heavily or the dough will become too elastic to form discs on the flat surface, when the dough is ready, it should squirt out between your fingers when squeezed but hold it's shape when rolled into a ball.
Roll the dough into balls about a 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Press each ball onto a lightly oiled baking sheet, thin until the biscuit reaches about a 3 inch diameter.
Using a Pastry Perforator or a large nail, poke about 16 holes in each disc of dough.
Bake for 30 minutes, flip the biscuits and reduce the heat to 200 F, then, bake the other side for 30 minutes.
After cooled, Place Biscuits back on sheet overnight and then place into a 200 degree oven for 30 minutes. This method is called the "Bis Coctuit" or Twice Bake.
A Hard Tack Biscuit which has been twice baked can be expected to remain fresh, edible and devoid of moisture for upto 2 months, by repeating the twice bake, every day for upto 8 days, the Hard Tack Biscuit can be expected to last upto a maximum of 2 years in nothing more than a cloth sack.
I have stored them in a vacuum bag for upto 4 years and they are just as hard, fresh and devoid of moisture as day 1.
Historically, Simple Biscuits were still eaten even when completely infested with weevils.
To Eat:
You can just chew through the hardtack but the most enjoyment and nutrition can be obtained by using it as an ingredient.
One of the most common methods of preparation is to crack the biscuits into 4 or 5 pieces each and boil them until soft in a broth of salted bacon rinds and wild or winter onions, this method is called "Cawl" and takes little imagination to produce a tasty dish. Just think of the Hard Tack as dumplings and cook it until it is about that consistency.
My personal Favorite is to use the Hard Tack in a dish called "LobScouse."
Boil about 2 quarts of water and add to it about a pound of Dry Salted Beef, or canned beef, add onions and a liberal amount of pepper to the pot and cook until a salty, cloudy broth forms. Make sure to remove any foam that forms on top of the pot.
Add carrots and Potatoes or any other root or kole vegetables that you might have (this is a great recipe to utilizes wild edibles like cattail roots.) When the vegetables are soft take 6 biscuits, place them in a bag and beat with a log or mallet, add the broken biscuits to the stew and boil until thick. The final dish should be a meaty porridge full of roots and onions.
