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Post by paranger on May 30, 2021 15:28:52 GMT -7
I use a small brass trade kettle (1/2 gallon), a small tin cup (coffee/tea/chocolate) and a wooden noggin that gets used for a bowl. The kettle is large enough to make stew for 4-5 guys... Same for me. |
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Post by Black Hand on May 30, 2021 15:32:37 GMT -7
Another in the group brings a kettle too - gets used exclusively for coffee. Each person has at least one vessels they can cook in, though we eat as a mess which has simplified things immensely. There is always a collection of other foodstuffs that get shared, so if you go hungry, it's your own damn fault...
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Post by paranger on May 30, 2021 15:38:18 GMT -7
I used to carry one of those handy nesting trekking sets: redware cup inside a tin-lined copper cup inside a corn boiler. I admit it is handy if you are by youself.
However, thay are not very pc, and I found that - as BH said - if you are with a group, 1 or 2 kettles between you plus a wooden bowl or trencher, spoon, and tin cup per man will cover all your needs.
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Post by Sicilianhunter on May 30, 2021 16:42:34 GMT -7
When traveling in a smaller group I carry a small tin kettle that has a lid that can double as a plate with a small tin cup that fits inside it with a little extra room for a cloth to take the rattle out of the package. I keep some tea/chocolate/sugar in the cup. It was sold to me as a British mess kit from Early American tin lighting but I haven’t verified the authenticity other than the pic provided.  |
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Post by spence on May 30, 2021 21:42:44 GMT -7
I've tried to incorporate the food I eat and the equipment I fix it with in my impression, and that means I carry very little. My usual cooking kit is only a small tin kettle with lid/plate and a tin cup. If I'm eating meat I never fry it, usually roast it on a stick, occasionally boil it. If I plan to have anything like a soup or stew I may take along a small gourd bowl which weighs nothing. I also frequently include a small gourd or two for rockahominy, coffee and/or brown sugar, maybe a cloth sack for cornmeal if I plan to have ash cakes. Long ago I did carry a folding handle skillet and fry some bacon or other meat occasionally, but gave up on that, not worth the weight. All my cooking kit, food and its containers comfortably fit in my haversack, and it has been a long time since I took anything more than that.
I never make any complicated dishes, have only trekked solo for a lot of years, so I don't need much. Trying to do it as the old boys might have done is a lot of fun, with the added benefit of simplicity.
Spence
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Post by Black Hand on Jun 2, 2021 11:47:48 GMT -7
I've also replace a small cast-iron fry pan with a sheet steel skillet I made - as you can imagine, much lighter....
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Post by artificer on Aug 10, 2021 8:17:48 GMT -7
I've also replaced a small cast-iron fry pan with a sheet steel skillet I made - as you can imagine, much lighter.... I never did historic trekking, per se, but as an Assistant Scout Master of a High Adventure troop, I "trekked" with the historic equipment I used in re-enacting. My "Mess Kit" was the smallest size "cold handle" sheet Iron skillet, which even though it came out after the Civil War, had been allowed for use in reenacting that time period. Still, it is basically the same thing as the sheet steel skillet you made, which I would have preferred, BTW. I had a "smallish" spun, thin pewter plate that weighed very little and I used that as a lid over the skillet and plate. I had a tin cup as well. I used an 18th century repro pewter spoon and because I was "civilized," I also used my two tine fork. Never bothered with a period bowl, just ate that sort of food right out of the skillet. The first time out with this stuff, I tied the tin cup outside my pack and tied the skillet on the rear outside of my pack, as well. You should have heard the comments by the boys who had always used the super light/fold into itself mess kits. They had never seen that kind of skillet. I could have sold tickets 17 miles later that night when we camped and the boys looked at my "antique" cooking/eating equipment. I fried taters and onions in the skillet while I cooked meat on a stick over the fire. The Scoutmaster was a little older than I and I heard him say, "Is that potatoes and onions you are cooking, I haven't had that in YEARS?" Since my step son turned his nose up to them, he and I enjoyed them. More than enough for two full grown men could be cooked in that little skillet. Gus |
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