On Mon, 25 Oct 1999, Louise Anderson wrote:

> Actually, I make "pemmican" without technology...by using ground beef high
> in fat (raw) with dried fruit- usually cherries, blueberries or
> cranberries. Just grind it all up and then dry it out.
> I do little balls and then flatten them. They make great travel food.
>
> How would that require technology?

This is not the sort of pemmican that is described in
Neanderthin, and it would not have the same properties.  Pemmican
uses rendered kidney fat because this fat is high in saturates
and therefore very stable and oxidation resistant.  As Troy
pointed out, you need fire to render the fat.

Ground beef is made by adding fat -- from wherever -- to the lean
meat and grinding them together.  Typically the fat that is used
is whatever is trimmed from the carcass as it is cut up, or fat
from the dewflap deposit.  This fat, from a grain-fattened animal
(on a free-range animal this fat would be minimal), contains
considerable polyunsaturates as well as saturates, and is more
prone to rancidity.  Pemmican made in this way would therefore be
more likely to spoil than pemmican made from tallow from rendered
suet.

The bottom line is that for a pre-technological hunter-gatherer,
there is no high-fat "ground beef" as we understand it to use for
making pemmican.

Todd Moody
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