cooking a damper

[sandsnakes]

http://www.australianoutdoors.com/howtodamper.htm

Found this link, shows how to cook an Australian damper. Not sue if the technique will work here in our damp soil, but am going to give it a try. Having trid a damper at Swan Hill and a goldmine, the treat of taste is molases... dam tasty!


Sandsnakes

 

[timtom1]

good find, using a ember pit works well too.

 

[gregorach]

The traditional way I've heard of (never seen, or even heard first hand from someone who has seen) is to use the dough literally as a damper (hence the name) on the embers of the fire. I'm not at all sure that a cast iron camp oven would find a place in many a jolly swagman's matilda...

I've heard of attempts at using this method, but never with success. I suspect that you might need to cook it very slowly. If you could arrange it so that your damper took most of the night to cook, that'd be ideal - warm bread in the morning!

 

[falling rain]

I was watching Michael Palin's 'Sahara' the other day and the Tuareg nomads he was travelling across the Sahara with were cooking bread in the sand with embers underneath and top of the bread http://www.racingshadow.com/albums/LibyaEclipse2006/photo18-12.html It looked very tasty I've cooked ash cakes before straight on the ashes of my fire, but never tried the larger breads. Must give it a try next time I'm on the beach. I really like these simple ways of cooking with minimum or no utensils. A couple of times I've done vegetables on the embers like this too. Sweet potato, baked potato, carrots, burdock root - definately no need for tin foil and you can bake the nan breads you can buy the same way. Just tap the sand/earth off with a small stick when cooked. Excellent stuff.

 

[jdlenton]

I'm not at all sure that a cast iron camp oven would find a place in many a jolly swagman's matilda...

could you not use a billy in the same manner it might work ?

 

[gregorach]

could you not use a billy in the same manner it might work ?

Perhaps, but I'm not sure that a billy has the right heating characteristics (too thin). Besides, a swagman's billy is full of tea!