Imagine a fantasy character about to set off on an adventure; what food do they pack? To help save you research time, today I wanted to give suggestions.
Recently, I talked about hardtack (a cracker or biscuit made for travel), but this post will be a list focusing on different ways you might make foods last longer.
Some of these might be a bit heavy or inconvenient for foot travel, but I am including them for adventures that might involve a wagon or boat.
Dried Foods
Jerky is meat that has been cut into strips, (sometimes) salted, and dried to prevent spoilage. If done right, it can be stored for months without going bad; making it the perfect food for both travel and winter storage.
The word “jerky” derives from the Quechua word ch’arki which means “dried, salted meat”
Wikipedia
All around our world, cultures have different names for this; sukuti, pastirma, pemmican, and borts, are but a small portion of examples.
Some people dry the meats in the sun, some smoke them slowly over the fire, and others air-dry the strips. When finished, you have a light-weight and preserved meat that is ready for travel.
Some fruits can also be dried, which pemmican is a good example of. That travel food is made from dried meat, tallow, and berries.
Dried herbs are also a light-weight option to carry for cooks to make meals taste a little better while out on the trail.
Food Pies:
While we like a light pie dough now, historically, the goal was sometimes just preservation.
After making a clay-like dough, you work it into a pot shape then put in your filling. Finally, pinch the lid closed and use an egg-wash to help seal it. When done, the pies can be shelf-stable for a week or more.
Townsends has a great video on this here.
Essentially, you are making an air-tight seal, so the goal is not really for an edible crust; you might just eat out of it like a bowl(similar to trenchers; a bread bowl common in the middle-ages).
Sometimes, the pies were even sold food-truck style from oven’s on wheels.
With their long shelf-life and the availability to purchase them last minute from a baker or street seller, your character might place meat pies into a wicker container before heading out on adventures.
Salted Meat
To make salted meat — such as salted pork — you alternate between adding the salt and meat(which has a good salt rub upon it) into a barrel.Not only does the salt act as a preservation seasoning, but it also helps keep away air and moisture. This would result in preserved and pre-cut meat that you could either buy as a full barrel, or by the piece.
At room temperature, it can be stable for months (some even stating up to a year).
Salted meats were common for use on ships, but if your character happens to have a wagon, it could be used for that type of travel as well.
“On a visit to the collection of the esteemed Mr. Mason today with a pong of fish hanging over all! This old lantern slide shows a scene of great industry with lots of barrels and busy people under the watchful eye of the aptly titled overseer!” From Here
Pickling:
Pickling goes as far back as ancient Mesopotamia (2400 BCE), and has a long history for many places all around the world. It was a great way to preserve food for both winter stores and long journeys.
If you regularly grab a jar of kimchi, sauerkraut, or pickles, you are familiar with this one already.
Most commonly, pickling is reserved for vegetables(such as cabbage, cucumbers, and carrots), but in some places, you might also find pickled eggs or fish as well. The pickling is done using a solution of either vinegar, or with anaerobic fermentation in brine.
Ice
In the past, if you lived close to a ice cave, you might use it as a community freezer(something even cavemen did). However, for elsewhere, if you were wealthy enough, you might have an ice-cellar or ice-house. For these, you would either have the ice cut or skimmed from a pond in winter, then put into the shelter to preserve it’s temperature longer, or you would have the ice shipped in blocks.
Later in history, having ice delivered became less expensive for some areas, which lead to the invention and use of ice-boxes. These were typically wood boxes with a tray for ice at the top and drainage at the bottom. The food was stored on shelves between those, and would be cooled by the ice. Basically, they are a mix in tech of a refrigerator and a travel cooler.
If you are writing fantasy, you could have ice boxes be around and used on ships or other travel.
Sugars
De Re Coquinaria (The Art of Cooking) which is a cookbook from 1st century AD has a recipe with heated fruit and sugar that could sound familiar to the jams and jellies common today.
Finally, candying foods can also help them last longer. For a fancy example; if you take edible flower petals and dip the petals into sugar syrup they will set as “candied petals.” These can last many months.
Meats Potted with Butter
For this, you take well-cooked pounded and seasoned meat and put it in the oven so that the seasoning helps pasteurize the meat. Finally, you put it in a pot while trying to push out all the air, fill the remaining portion with butter or oil, then cover the pot. The butter or oil air-seals the meat into the pot, helping it keep for longer.
Once the seal of butter is broken, the meat is no longer protected, so several serving-sized pots would be used instead of one big one.
“Put into a dish, and place in the oven half an hour; afterward pack it in potting-pots or little stone jars, which cover with a layer of clarified butter (lukewarm), and tie bladders or paste paper over them. This is convenient for sandwiches. The butter may be used again for basting meats or for making meat-pies.”
Quote from “Practical Cooking and Dinner Giving: A Treatise Containing Practical Instructions in Cooking” by Mary F. Henderson(1876), but I found it on Historical Foodways.
While meat typically can start going bad within hours (the time can change depending on temperature and humidity), when in a pot and stored in a cool cellar, they can last months.
This method is much quicker than drying meats, so it is very convenient if you have left-overs from a meal, or have more meat from a slaughtered animal than you can eat in one meal.
For your stories, this is of course a great one for any characters in homes, but it could also be a great last-minute travel food for any characters lucky enough to have a wagon to carry them. You might even be able to carry a few in a bag.
Sun-Dried Clay:
If you want your fresh produce to last longer, all it might take is some clay and the sun. For example, in Afghanistan, you might see grapes stored in a clay vessel called a Kangina. When stored somewhere cool (sometimes burried) the grapes can last up to 6 months.
“When each pair of rustic “earthenware bowls” is completely dried, around 1kg of ripe unbruised fruit are put inside, and then sealed with another serving of mud to form a single closed, air-tight vessel.”
Farmizen
The added benefit of this is that sellers can protect their produce from spoiling in the heat of the sun by either only cracking open as many as they need, or by selling them directly in the vessels.
[[There is a video you can watch about this here. ]]
Briar Crawford 
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