Pemmican << PEHM uh kuhn >> was an early form of concentrated food made by North American Indians. It was made from dried buffalo or other game meat. Indians often hung the meat at the top of a tipi to dry over a campfire, which gave the meat a smoky flavor. They pounded the dried meat into a powder and mixed it with hot fat. When this mixture cooled, it was cut into cakes. Sometimes berries were added for flavor. Pemmican served as an important food when the tribes migrated. Pemmican keeps almost indefinitely and takes up little room.
Other cultures developed dried meat foods similar to pemmican. They include biltong of South Africa and charqui—now known as jerky—of South America. Today, some forms of dried meat are marketed as pemmican.
