3-Days of Marching Rations

[Paul Elliott]

Later this week I'm at a Roman event and we normally cook meals like crazy and stuff ourselves on Roman cuisine. This week though, I'm planning to strictly adhere to a 3 day diet of Roman marching rations.

I have found a wonderful source, Jonathon Roth's 1998 book The Logistics of the Roman Army at War 264BC-AD235. He presents the evidence as well as the thoughts of past academics to come up with some decent figures on ration allowances.

Below is a photo of a single day's ration. It is composed of:

Hardtack 650g
Smoked salt pork 160g
Lentils 50g
Smoked Cheese 27g
Olive Oil 50ml
Salt 40g
Wine 0.37 l
I did not include the vinegar, just realised! That should be 0.13 l

[Vindex]

It looks like an ancient version of Ready Steady Cook ( a UK cooking programme where contestants buy the food and a posh chef makes something splendid out of it!)

Some way-side herbs and a purloined onion or two and that's a scrummy (if repetitive) meal mile:

[Paul Elliott]

Yes, I remember that show! I know that the Northern troops in the Civil War cooked 'skilleegalee' which was bacon and crumbled hardtack fried together. I coud do that for breakfast or lunch. For dinner I suppose lentils, with a bit of onion, maybe with a dash of wine and some salt ...??

[Paul Elliott]

Yes, I remember that show! I know that the Northern troops in the Civil War cooked 'skilleegalee' which was bacon and crumbled hardtack fried together. I could do that for breakfast or lunch. For dinner I suppose lentils, with a bit of onion, maybe with a dash of wine and some salt ...??

[Kegluneq]

Thank you for the photo, it really helps to visualise what the daily rations will have looked like! I hope your bucellatum turns out better than mine did - my hard tack is the dog's milk of bread, it only lasts longer because no one will eat it... Nice to have a use for my pestle and mortar though.

I have found a wonderful source, Jonathon Roth's 1998 book The Logistics of the Roman Army at War 264BC-AD235. He presents the evidence as well as the thoughts of past academics to come up with some decent figures on ration allowances.

Have you seen Marcus Junkelmann's Panis Militaris? In it he recreates a number of Roman recipes using military equipment and food found on military sites. The photos are wonderful. I don't think his is based on marching rations though!

[M. Demetrius]

What do you wrap your salt pork in to keep the fat from getting on everything around it? I know they didn't use Tupperware....

[Nathan Ross]

Below is a photo of a single day's ration.

I remember that some of the recipes in your 'Last Legionary' book sounded quite appealing, but seeing the ingredients laid out like that it does look a bit...meagre. I suppose if all the men in a tent-group combined their portions it may have produced something a bit more substantial though!

That heap of biscuits/hardtack reminds me of a meal I was treated (if that's the right word) to a few weeks ago in southern Italy - it was 'cucina povera', proper peasant food rather than the 'Italian cuisine' we often imagine so fondly... Anyway, the main course was a dish filled with chunks of dry stale bread that had been soaked in water then lightly sprinkled with olive oil. Just that - maybe a few chopped herbs on top. It combined sogginess and teeth-breaking crunchiness, but was surprisingly filling. Bit of sour sheep's-cheese to follow, a beaker of earthy wine and that's the lot. Perhaps not dissimilar to your Roman marching meal?

[Paul Elliott]

Nathan, that sounds exactly like a Roman marching meal...soaked buccellatum with oil, plus a bit of cheese, plus wine/posca. So its still being eaten is it? Where abouts in Italy was that Nathan?

[agrimensor]

I was thinking on a kind of pancake water olive oil and spelt flower. Looks a lot like the "chapati"still in use in India.
For posca i use 1/10 applecidrevinegar on 9/10 of water.

[Paul Elliott]

What do you wrap your salt pork in to keep the fat from getting on everything around it? I know they didn't use Tupperware....

Normally I carry everything in authentic containers so I have no problems cooking and so on, in front of the public. Plus its part of the fun. But with meat I almost always carry it in foil and sealed plastic to keep it fresh and clean and stop it contaminating anything else. ON a long route march I did once carry the meat wrapped in a piece of goatskin, but obviously I wasn't keen to use it again and threw it away. Using linen is no go, I tried that, it just lets the meat juices through too quickly. If anyone has a better idea (a pot of some kind?) I'd love to hear it. Obviously some meat was handed out to soldiers, how did they carry it? How did Napaleonic soldiers or ECW soldiers carry theirs?

Looking at the hardtack I may be revising my portions! I'm not marching 20 miles, digging a stretch of ditch or fighting in a battle, so I won't be needing those 3,300 calories! Along with 380g of wholemeal flat bread I have (simulating 'cooking freshly made bread in the embers of the fire - Caracalla, or was it Hadrian? style') the hardtack will last me the 3 days I think.

The wine ration will certainly be supplemented in the evening around the camp fire! Although I will be drinking watered posca during the day.

[Paul Elliott]

I was thinking on a kind of pancake water olive oil and spelt flower. Looks a lot like the "chapati"still in use in India.
For posca i use 1/10 applecidrevinegar on 9/10 of water.

Posca: definately lots of water with the vinegar! I made up my posca as 1/2 wine vinegar 1/2 red wine, and I will dilute it as needed during the day.

[Nathan Ross]

Where abouts in Italy was that Nathan?

In a village called Moio, just outside Vallo della Lucania, Salerno province. It was supposedly traditional food from the Cilento region, but basically it was an old-as-the-hills peasant meal.

I was hoping I might find some of that Lucanian sausage that Apicius talks about, but the only meat was some very fatty raw bacon...

[Vindex]

The fat from the pork will soak into either the crumbled hard tack or lentils, kept moist with a dash of water.

Lentils and the smoked cheese together would also be good, but lentils need quite a lot of water to soak/cook in. I wonder if they cooked their days' rations together then divided it up and carried it cooked?

Lentils and dill/cheverill/parsley is also tasty but not sure how filling it would be after a hard day's work/march. The pork an hard tack would certainl be filling.

Do you subscirbe to Pass the Garum blog? It may be worth while having a look at his site/contacting him to see what he can come up with. I'll do the same for a bit of fun (when I get some spare time).

[Epictetus]

I wonder if you could wrap the pork in waxy leaves? Would that keep the fat from getting all over everything?

[Flavivs Aetivs]

Later this week I'm at a Roman event and we normally cook meals like crazy and stuff ourselves on Roman cuisine. This week though, I'm planning to strictly adhere to a 3 day diet of Roman marching rations.

I have found a wonderful source, Jonathon Roth's 1998 book The Logistics of the Roman Army at War 264BC-AD235. He presents the evidence as well as the thoughts of past academics to come up with some decent figures on ration allowances.

Below is a photo of a single day's ration. It is composed of:

Hardtack 650g
Smoked salt pork 160g
Lentils 50g
Smoked Cheese 27g
Olive Oil 50ml
Salt 40g
Wine 0.37 l
I did not include the vinegar, just realised! That should be 0.13 l

That bread looks good, you got a recipe?