Thread: NZ Forest Service Cook Book

Thinking a little more about those meals we used to cook up. One of the main factors I think was that our hunting or animal survey jobs were actual work; with targets to be met. Basically 7 days a week until moved out. It was'nt like a few days semi glide time hunting holiday--- it was work; but an enjoyable sort of work for most of us. There were few, if any cut tracks or anything other than rough bush or terrain. Even gas stoves were virtually non existent so all cooking was over an open fire. Collecting and cutting fuel was an essential chore. Personal washing was mostly in the nearest stream. So actually the only time we could more or less call our own was cooking and enjoying the sheer pleasure and innovation we applied to it, along with the gallons of billy tea and a few quiet smokes in the evening. Mostly the only after dark lighting was with candles mounted in used tins for reflectors. Clean the rifles, try to dry your socks and warm the boots, then read a book in the old farta before sleep. Unless high up, wet feet were a constant part of life each day from dawn till dusk. So--the busheman beer in the morning, a hot breakfast, and the evening cookup were our main relaxation and pleasures. Baking a new camp oven of bread and scoffing it hot was an ace pleasure, as @Scribe has described; even though it was sometimes what we termed "raisin bread", if the rats had got to the flour sack hanging in the rafters

Great read. Thanks for posting.

First time I came across "ptomaine poisoning" and had to look it up, just called food poisoning nowadays.

ptomaine [to´mān, to-mān´]
any of several toxic bases formed by decarboxylation of an amino acid, often by bacterial action, such as cadaverine, muscarine, and putrescine.
ptomaine poisoning a term commonly misapplied to food poisoning. Contrary to popular belief, ptomaines are not injurious to the human digestive system, which is quite capable of reducing them to harmless substances.

yep. with tinned food we always looked for a swollen top or any signs of pressure when the can was pierced. if so, it's contents were not consumed. One time we buried some butter and flour under river shingle to lighten our packs during a long distance fly camp trek. Almost a month later we returned, pretty hungry and dug it up. We cut about a fingers width off the outside and made damper with butter and flour. Was good as I recall. Another time we were getting a bit lean on it and shot a parry duck. We stuffed it with dried beech leaves and contents of some maggie soup packets. Then we wrapped it up in the empty packets and placed it under the ashes of our fire for an hour or so. better than nothing and tasted good but a bit dry.

I've had an old copy of that book for years. I remember lugging a camp oven in with me to some godfaorskane place once an a the end of the trip there was absolute silence as four trampers who only had some bags of dried fruit left watched me make battered venisen, some version of a scone bread with raisens, which I called a cake, and later on some pancakes in it on an open fire outside the hut. By the end of the night I had spent the night cooking and fed them all and there was bugger all for me!
I wish there was a cast iron camp oven in every hut. And more open fires in the huts. The modern DOC stoves down here are rubbish for cooking anything.

@Carlsen Highway a wise mate of mine once told me, "trampers & Kea's -never feed them otherwise you'll never get rid of them"

Yep. Putta putta putta. Drive you nuts.