Hardtack

To pick up from my last post - let's get back to the Hardtack; but first....

Setting aside for the future:
Has anyone else noticed how much food costs lately? My local W...mart keep getting more and more costly. 1 1/2 years ago, their brand of green beans was .50 (I save receits). Today, that same can is now .89. Rice, for a small bag was .59 and now it's $1.49! Forget trying to find other brand names on their shelves. They are now few and far between.
1 1/2 years ago my weekly food bill usually ran between $65 - $75; today buying mostly just their brand, my bill runs right about $145- $155 weekly!!
I don't know about you but for me, I'm tired of it. Tired of buying only what they think I should buy and how much I should spend in their store.
Folks, I haven't even mentioned the other items that have to be picked up weekly. Like the stuff in the pharmacy area, tolietries, cat litter and the other non food related stuff! Please, don't tell me to shop elsewhere. I have and I do and will continue to wean myself off of W...mart when I find the specific items I need elsewhere.
Thank goodness my local Sav A Lot and Dollar Tree are still in the business of catering to their customers! Too bad they just don't carry everything I need.
Anyway, getting off my band box now... I am determined to go back to the ways of my youth. No longer will I shop blindly "because I can". I'm going back to a budget, a weekly menu and canning, preserving, making my own mixes and cleansers AND making do! In a word- going back to a more frugal and less dependant lifestyle not only because of food prices soaring sky-high but because that's how we should live. We are an extremely spoiled people and nation. It's time to get back to basics and stop the waste. No, I'm no tree hugger. I'm just "stepping outside of the norm" so to speak. Getting back to being who I am that I forgot all about along the way of life. "Nuff said.
Harktack: I've been wanting to make it for quite awhile. Today was the day I got off my lazy rear and did it. It is the simplest thing in the world to bake - anyone can do it. You can find historical recipes all over the internet which is where I began my research. In midieval days they had a form of it called a treacher. It was used waaay back then as their actual plate or bowl. The food was placed in it to serve, the treacher sopped up the juices and they ate it all. It add more "filling" power to the meal. Later, the pioneers ate it to help fill out their meals on the trails as they pushed every onward West. It kept a very good long time and even the Civil War soldiers carried it and often it was the only thing they had to eat.
So, the first thing I did was choose a flour with nutritional value. I keep several kinds of flour and am very partial to whole wheat. So- duh- no brainer! I used King Authur's All Natural Traditional whole wheat flour mostly because the bag was open in the freezer from a recent baking and it needed to be used. Next time, I will probably use the stone ground wheat I got from a mill up North.
Here's the pics of the hardtack mixed, rolled, cut and poked and finally baked.
It's not quite ready to be eaten/tried yet. They are just out of the oven before I ran up here to post this. They say it gets harder and harder as it cools.
SO, that's my post on Hardtack. I'll let you know how it turned out taste-wise later.
Next time I'll tell you about my butter I canned or possibly the home-made laundry soap I made or maybe about the pickled cabbage I want to get around to trying.