# Survival > Primitive Skills & Technology >  a few questions about bannock

## commoguy

ive been reading more and more about bannock and i dont know if im hungry or what but id really like to make some when i go home on leave.  i have a few questions though.  since bannock is a survival food id assume it can go a few days without being refrigerated but does anyone have an idea or know how long?  also if i want to make this at the house how would i go about baking it?  i suppose i could always make it over the bbq pit, though.  not to sound too city oriented but they say in the wilderness you cook it by wrapping it around a green tree branch.  well how do you get the branch at least semi sanitized?  would you strip the bark and stick it in the fire for a few minutes or what?

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## Sam

> ive been reading more and more about bannock and i dont know if im hungry or what but id really like to make some when i go home on leave.  i have a few questions though.  since bannock is a survival food id assume it can go a few days without being refrigerated but does anyone have an idea or know how long?  also if i want to make this at the house how would i go about baking it?  i suppose i could always make it over the bbq pit, though.  not to sound too city oriented but they say in the wilderness you cook it by wrapping it around a green tree branch.  well how do you get the branch at least semi sanitized?  would you strip the bark and stick it in the fire for a few minutes or what?


 you can cook it in an skillet, I will find a recipe.

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## crashdive123

There's quite of few recipes out there - Sarge posted some I think.  This will get you started.  http://www.best-bread-recipes.com/bannock-recipe.html

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## skunkkiller

just debark the stick hardwood spirl the dough round the stick and cook over hot coals.what you don't eat will keep for about a week but most likely you will eat it before then and make more.

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## tacmedic

It does not require any refrigeration.  Eventually it will begin to gather mold or due to the oil content can go rancid, but the point of the bread is to be a shelf stable staple that will be able to provide sustenance for a long trip.  My though has always been that if I keep it to the point that it begins to mold or go rancid, it probably is time to make some fresh anyway.

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## Rick

Hard tack will last until he...uh, a long time. My latest batch of whole wheat hard tack is over a month old and it's still going strong. Jerky and hard tack will carry you a long way.

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## Sourdough

Real men eat Pilot Bread daily, Sailor Boy, pilot bread.

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## Sarge47

1st, here's a similar thread from sometime back:

http://www.wilderness-survival.net/f...hlight=Bannock

Next here's a Bannock recipe from an old camping book of mine:

4 cups of flour; 1/3 cup cold bacon fat; 6 Tablespoons of sugar; 1teaspoon salt; 4teaspoons baking powder; milk or water.

Mix dry ingredients, then cream in fat with a fork.  Add small amount of water or milk until dough gathers into a ball with no dry spots but not sloppy wet. (too much moisture makes the bread soggy.)  Press into a round cake not more than one inch thick.  Dust top & bottom with dry flour.  Get skillet hot, rub bottom(of pan :Big Grin: ) with grease, dust with dry flour, & lay in the bread.  Brown both sides. Cook about 15 minutes or until a sliver of wood or a dry grass stem thrust into loaf's center comes out clean.  Some cooks finish bread by propping skillet on edge before the open fire; others hold the skillet above the open flame the entire time.  If you use the latter way remember to turn bread over frequently.

Then there's this recipe for longer storage life:

                                    CAMPAIGN BREAD.
This bread keeps a long time since it contains no grease.

4 cups of flour, 3 teaspoons sal, 4 teaspoons baking powder, (about) 3 cups of water, 1/4 cup of sugar.

Mix dry ingredients.  Add only enough water to make a dough that will slowly level itself off in the pan.  Bake about 45 minutes, depending on loaf's thickness.  When done, sprinkle top with sugar, and let it melt before eating.  Cinnamon may be mixed with the suagar.  Serves 4.

I'll look around for other recipes. :Cool:

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## Rick

I make this recipe quite a bit. It lasts forever! The recipe calls for whole wheat flour but I much prefer processed flour for the taste. 

Army Hardtack Recipe

Ingredients:

•	4 cups flour (perferably whole wheat) 
•	4 teaspoons salt 
•	Water (about 2 cups) 
•	Pre-heat oven to 375° F 
•	Makes about 10 pieces 

Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl. Add just enough water (less than two cups) so that the mixture will stick together, producing a dough that won’t stick to hands, rolling pin or pan.  Mix the dough by hand. Roll the dough out, shaping it roughly into a rectangle. Cut into the dough into squares about 3 x 3 inches and ½ inch thick.

After cutting the squares, press a pattern of four rows of four holes into each square, using a nail or other such object. Do not punch through the dough.  The appearance you want is similar to that of a modern saltine cracker.  Turn each square over and do the same thing to the other side.
Place the squares on an ungreased cookie sheet in the oven and bake for 30 minutes. Turn each piece over and bake for another 30 minutes. The crackers should be slightly brown on both sides.

The fresh crackers are easily broken but as they dry, they harden and assume the consistency of fired brick.

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## crashdive123

Rick - I tried your recipe a while back and enjoyed it.  Thanks.

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## Rick

It really is quite tasty.....for hard tack. When I'm out I usually drop a piece or two in my dinner while I eat and let it soften up.

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## Sarge47

Here's the 1st recipe I ever cooked.  I was 8 or 9 years old & my brother, a year younger than I, loved it.  It's right out of the 1943 "Handbook For Boys" (Boy Scouts of America)  It sounds suspiciously like Rick's "Hard-tack recipe" scaled down for kids to make.

                            Unleavened Bread.

Can be made quickly & will keep almost indefinately.

2 1/2 pints (?) of flour, 1 tablespoonful of sugar, 1 scant tablespoon of salt.

Mix with water to a stiff dough & knead & pull.  Roll out thin, like crackers & mark into squares with knife.  Use as little water as possible if you want it to "keep".  A teaspoon of lard or butter worked in with the flour  is good but reduces the "keeping" qualities.

I cooked it in a cast iron skillet on a gas stove top.  Probably used a little lard in the skillet to help but don't remember. :Cool:

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## Bibow

mine stays good in a warm soggy hunting jacket for over three weeks

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## trax

Bannock and hard tack are quite a bit different. Bannock should be like a gi-normous baking powder biscuit really. mmmmm, hard tack should be like hard tack. Bannock will turn on you sooner than hard tack will. If you have a cast iron frying pan in your camp, make bannock the same way you'd bake it, set it in the fry pan about six or eight inches away from the fire and set it on about a 45 degree angle and turn the bannock around in the pan (not turning it over) When it's golden brown on top, it's done. The less you knead bannock dough, the better it's going to turn out for you.

So Bibow...I have two questions:

1. What keeps in your soggy warm jacket for three weeks? Hard tack or bannock

2. How hungry do you have to be to sample food that's been in your soggy warm jacket for three weeks? You know bannock is supposed to be neither green nor furry right?

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## Rick

Neither is hardtack! Yuck!

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## LudwigVan

What exactly IS that, Rick?

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## laughing beetle

Yeah, really, what is (or was) that?  Now, I have lost things in the back of the fridge from time to time, (had a pet peach in college), but that picture is way beyond my experiences.

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## huntermj

Since were talking about bread i thought i would through in a real simple fry bread recipe.


1 C flour  

1 t baking powder  

1/4 C powdered milk  

1/4 t salt  

warm water  

I premix dry ingredients and put in plastic bags, also i keep a small bag of plain flower for my hands and just in case i use too much water.  In the field mix with just enough water so there is no dry bits left but not runny. Fry up in a skillet with a little oil. Just a few minutes on each side and you have tasty bread. Dont know how long it will stay good for, it only last a few minutes with me :Smile:

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## laughing beetle

Hunter, that sounds good, i'll have to try that.

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## wareagle69

hmm nvere knew bannock to last more than a couple of minutes maybe i should see ifn it will last longer than that also any stick will do just wrap it around and cook

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## HOP

I like bannock use to make it a lot when I went night fishing for catfish. Mandatory fire provided the heat.

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## ATough

Heres another great recipe for Bannock.


MULTI GRAIN BANNOCK:

1 Cup Barley flour
1 Cup Wheat flour
1/2 Cup Rolled Oats
1 Cup White Sugar
1/2 to 1 Cup Raisins or other dried fruit
1 1/2 Cup Buttermilk (only if you have some on say your first day.)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tbsp. Coarse Ground Salt
1 tbsp. Cinnamon
1 tbsp. Cloves
1 tbsp. Nutmeg

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## crashdive123

Sarge - Move to Survival Food

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## Nativedude

This is the recipe that I use for my students that I take out on primitive living trips.

*BANNOCK*2     Cups Flour
1     Stick Butter
3     Tablespoons Sugar
1     Teaspoon Salt
1     Teaspoon Baking Powder
1/2  Cup Powdered Milk

Mix all ingredients together until mixture is like sand. Place in zip-lock bag. You can use it all at once or a little at a time. And it will last a long time as long as you keep the bag zipped.

Makes about 1 pound.

When you are ready to use, mix with a little water until it becomes a dough. Cook and eat when cooled.

ENJOY!

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## Austin Barlow

Sorry folks, but I look at bannock as something more along the lines of dessert.  I also make it with a very simple recipe.

First get yourself some flour, as much as you want.

Then get yourself some cinnamon sugar, enough so that it's visibly mixed in and equally distributed throughout the sugar.

Then mix water into it until you've got a nice dough going on.  Now I greased up a frying pan with just a little bit of butter, but if you're out in the wild I'm sure you'll get by either without butter or by substituting animal fat for it.                                        

Like everyone says, cook until golden brown and booyah, you've got what I call the dessert version of pita bread.  mmmmm, I'd make some for breakfast tomorrow if our gas lines weren't out of commission.  By the way, this recipe makes it taste quite a bit like fried dough that you get at carnivals and the like.

Enjoy,

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## little_john

Anyone ever made bannock exclusively with items foraged? Flour from grinding roots, etc?

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## edr730

We always made two kinds of bannock. The first we made without sugar, in the oven in small one inch round patties...we called them biscuits. We made another and we added sugar with a bit more water and we put them in a spoonful glob on the pan....we called them shortcake. Then we had about the same thing with lots of water and a couple eggs and fried the mixture on a hot skillet and we called them pancakes. I think the stick is the thing that turns it into bannock.

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## Winselc

has anyone made bannock from the flour made from cattails,...and what happens if you remove the baking powder from the mixture, ie flour and water?

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## crashdive123

Hmmmm...while somebody is baking up an answer for you, how about heading over to the Introduction Section and tell us a bit about yourself.  Thanks.

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