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Monday, June 7, 2010

Hard Tack and Salt Tack....Yum!

Charlie came in again last week to share more about the Civil War. This time he brought his haversacks full of what a typical soldier would carry...food, a plate and fork, a tin cup, a piece of paper with their information on it (which was the equivalent of today's dogtags), bullets, canteen, etc. He made coffee in the old percolater (decaf!), hard tack, salt tack, and corn bread for the kids to try.
Here's Teressa trying to chew the hard tack. Very enthusiastic.
Saylor is covering her mouth as she found it all quite horrific. During the Civil War, soldiers would put their hard tack into their boiling hot coffee to soften it (and to kill the weevils!)
Jayde said the coffee tasted terrible. Everyone tried everything though and they were great sports. And then there was Johnny. Who wanted seconds on everything. I was seriously impressed. Did I mention that salt tack is salted pork fat?

3 comments:

  1. Teressa and Johnny have inherited their parents' propensity to eat anything that doesn't eat them first. They're nothing if not daring! I wish I had pictures of Johnny's first experience with Italian-style tripe on April vacation- words cannot describe! Both T & J are loving Charlie and Jackie's Civil War momentos. I'm totally jealous.

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  2. I'm almost bummed out that I didn't get to try any...but at the same time glad.

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  3. Wow, what an experience sampling the basic foods that soldiers ate during the Civil War. Personally, I think I would have gotten through some of the hard tack, as long as it was soaked real good in hot coffee but as for the salt tack, no thank you! So then everyone, does this mean the Aussie Vegemite tasted better?

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