Pemmican (A page by Huw)

Why pemmican?

Pemmican is a mixture of dried meat and suet which is eaten cold and which keeps for years under reasonable conditions.  The first recorded use of pemmican was by north American tribes (particularly the Assiniboin of Dakota and the sub-arctic peoples) by whom it had been used for generations.  It became more widely known in the 19th and early 20th centuries as a staple for polar explorers.  Although it is unlikely that pemmican has been made for long enough to have affected nutritional aspects of human evolution, it happens that pemmican recreates what was probably a dietary staple for one, two or three million years: fatty organ meats which were prized by hunter-gatherers over the lean meats we prefer today.  Pemmican uses suet (from around the organs of beef cattle).  Suet remains reasonably solid at room temperature whereas tallow or dripping are softer.  The fat composition of suet (USDA figures) is approximately 16:36:3 (SFA : MUFA : PUFA) compared with ratios of 52:44:4 for tallow.  The main difference is that tallow has more 18:1 MUFA and less SFA (18:0).

The great thing about pemmican is that enables students, city workers and others to eat fully paleo wherever they are; no washing up, no mess, minimal space, no need for refrigeration.

How I make pemmican

First, you have to make some jerky.  Freeze a big chunk (around 2 kilos) of whatever meat you like ( I use kangaroo (roo) or cheap organic beef...both boneless) and allow it to thaw a little so that it is easy to slice finely.  Cut into strips no more than 1/8" thick, and place on a tray on grease-proof paper.  Single layer of meat only.

Chuck into the oven at 60-80 degrees Celsius with the door propped open an inch or two to keep the air flowing through.  Take it out when it is all dry - should be done in about 12 or so hours.

Put the jerky through a blender to powderfy it.  You now have the meat content.

Part 2:  Get some beef suet (again, organic).  Chop it into little bits (about 1 cm cubes) and put it into a saucepan on low heat.  When all the fat has melted, pour it through a fine sieve to remove the lumps, cool it off and then melt it again.  The purpose of this heating and re-heating is twofold: to remove all lumps and to evaporate all water.  Drain the fat before it solidifies, making certain that there are no lumps left in there (the lumps go really well on a salad or with a stir-fry style meat dish...nice and crunchy).

Add the powdered jerky to the melted suet.  Try to keep the weight of each component equal - so 200g jerky should be added to 200g fat.  I usually go a little over with the fat because there is lots of fat but never enough jerky.

Mix up the mixture, and pour into muffin tins.  Put in the fridge and wait for it to solidify.  From my experience 60g per muffin pan is about right for a meal.

Wrap them up individually in grease-proof paper, and store them in the fridge for longest storage time.  They will last for weeks outside of a fridge, but I figure why risk it.

The macro-nutrient ratio of this pemmican when made with kangaroo meat is 45% protein, 54% fat and <1% water.  Kangaroo meat is only <3% fat; if you used beef or any other meat with a higher fat content, the ratios would change accordingly.

Any questions?  Ask.

Read more about pemmican in Ray Audette's classic book Neanderthin.

For more information about rendering suet, see Don Wiss' Paleofood site.

Here is a post from the Paleofood discussion list:
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Date:    Fri, 13 Feb 2004
From:    Jean-Claude Catry <instinct@SALTSPRING.COM>
Subject: Re: pemmican

> I've always made my own - I've never heard of a commercial source for authentic
> pemmican. If there is one, I would be very interested in knowing about it.

I am making grass fed pemmican from lamb or highland cattle and distribute it to interested persons. I am surely not commercial in the sense that I don't
produce more than what require conscious  practices to insure quality.  I don't believe in commercialization of foods and will wish for everybody to
be responsible producers of good quality foods and exchange between us for variety.

Delegating the power that each one of us have, to responsibly interact with our direct environment, to third commercial parties is the recipe for
the disaster we are in. Not only crappy foods are produced but also our natural resources get depleted, our relations ( all species ) are
forbidden the right to live and prosper also .

jean-claude
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Page last up-dated 15 February 2004