====== Bannock ======

Bannock is simple. Basically it is just a pan fried bread dough. Lots of
leeway in this recipe. Use your imagination with it. It can’t be hurt\!
LOL (unless you try and add chocolate chips\! ech.\!)

  * 3 cups of flour
  * baking powder
  * pinch of salt
  * enough water to mix into a paste like dough
  * Lard fry it in. Use a lot. 1/4’ in bottom of fry pan and add more later if needed.

Put it in the pan of hot grease and cook away\! You can put it in as one
piece, or shape it into ‘buns’.

I like to put in cheese chunks (small). Or cinnamon and raisins. Or wild
blueberries. I also like it with lots of sugar sometimes (if I’m craving
sweets in the bush). If I have butter, I love to eat it hot and dripping
in butter or even syrup. Or just dipped into melted moose fat.

I usually fry it in a fry pan. One side at a time, slowly, if you have
it leaned into the fire. Or, if you’ve lost the fry pan in the creek,
make the dough thicker and wrap it around a green willow branch to cook
over the coals.

Sometimes I bake it too. Grease bottom and sides of a bread pan, and
place in oven. What temp? I’ve no idea. I’d guess not too hot though,
cause it is thick and takes time for the middle to get done right. Can
also wrap in tin-foil and bake like that. In order not to burn it this
way though, I usually put it UNDER the coals, deep in the ashes or if
it’s a new fire, under the dirt. Slow and cooler is the ticket here.

Oh\! And if you are making a big pot of stew to last a day or so? Dump
in a couple of pieces of bannock (as if you were making a bun) and it
can be called a dumplin. Good stuff\!

\~\~\~\~

Cooking Bannock should be an enjoyable experience out in the wilderness
or at home\! I believe Bannock traditionally originated from Scottland,
but it’s basic recipe has no doubt been cooked worldwide. Bannock is a
type of bread roughly the thickness of a scone which is cooked/fried in
a pan, best cooked on the slow bed of embers left from a campfire in my
opinion.

The great thing about bannock is that you can chuck a wide variety of
foods into the mixture according to the time of year or what’s available
in your environment; Wild-Berries, honey, sultanas or fruit etc. can all
be thrown into the bannock (bread). Its this flexible recipe and ease of
cooking on a campfire that makes bannock a common bushcraft food.

My personal recipe is as follows:

  * Self-raising flour
  * Water
  * Honey
  * Raisins
  * Pinch of salt & sugar (optional)

Measurements? I could tell you now :p When I started off following a
recipe myself I went by exact measurements and what’not, but you’ll soon
learn when making Bannock its always good to go with the flow, play it
by ear and you’ll learn how much to mix to suit your needs. Use the
right amount of flour and water to get the mixture to a nice thick
doughy mix, so it isn’t sticking to your hands too bad at all and then
lightly flour either the dough or the pan, this will stop the bannock
sticking to the pan as you cook it.

Keep the Bannock moving every now and then when cooking, give it a
jiggle, or even a flip\! The best bannock I ever made was on a small bed
of left over campfire embers, spend about an hour or just over slow
cooking it with the recipe mentioned above