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CRICKETS FOR SURVIVAL
Crickets live in shallow tunnels dug beneath stones or dirt or in clumps of plant matter. Males can often be heard calling females for mating at night when they are more active. Most species are found in grasslands and forest, but many others can also be found near seashores, in marches, trees and caves.
TELLING THE TEMPERATURE WITH A CRICKET
A cricket’s chirp can help you determine the temperature. Crickets won’t chirp if it is warmer than a hundred degrees or less than 55 degrees Fahrenheit. Count the number of chirps sounding in a 15 second span of time. To this total, add 40. Your result will be the temperature in Fahrenheit. To determine the temperature in Celsius, count the chirps heard within 25 seconds, divide by three, then add four.
LIVE BAIT
Using crickets as live bait, you can catch fresh fish. Cricket fishing is well suited to shoreline fishing as it is most effective within 15 feet of the banks of small lakes.
Secure your hook to the fishing line and then place the cricket onto the hook. Firmly grasp the cricket between your fingers and thumb while you insert the hook. I’ve found some instructions that recommend inserting the barb behind the cricket’s head, into the thorax, and then pushing the hook along the length of the body, exiting the barb just beneath the tail, at the rear of the abdomen. This is in contrast to experienced fishermen that state the hook should be inserted at the rear, threaded through the body and exit just behind the head, through the thorax. Fish will attempt to suck your bait off of your hook and this method helps prevent loss of the cricket without hooking a fish.
A discarded can will serve well as a fishing reel. Anchor the free end of your fishing line and cast the baited hook into the water. Wrap your line around the can to bring the hook back. Continue to cast and reel in your line until you have a fish.
A SOURCE OF FOOD
Crickets reproduce twenty times faster than cattle raised for food. Over the span of three or four weeks, over 1,000 eggs can be laid by a female. Crickets require a fraction of the space and food needed to raise other forms of meat. These insects are twice as efficient at meat production as pigs or chickens. They can supply meat at a rate that is four times that of sheep and six times that of cattle, after deductions for trimming and dressing.
The meat from crickets provide protein and other nutrients. One hundred grams of cricket meat contains 3% carbohydrate, 6% fat and 21% protein in addition to 21 mgs calcium. For each gram dry weight of cricket meat there is 63 to 122 milligrams of fatty acid (linoleic acid & a0linolenic acid), copper, magnesium and iron. All of this is available for the cost of vegetable table scraps.
HERDING CRICKETS
A series of large trenches would be dug by the Paiute people as a means of catching crickets. Dry straw would be placed over this. Then the crickets would be driven into the trenches. Next, the straw was set ablaze and the crickets were roasted. Bushels of the roasted crickets were then gathered to be ground into flour used to bake protein-rich bread.
FARMING CRICKETS
Raising your own crickets will ensure that you have a ready supply that hasn’t been sprayed with pesticides or chemicals. Put about two inches of soil in the bottom of a large aquarium. Egg cartons can be placed inside to serve as roosts. Provide water by placing wet cotton balls inside. Grated vegetables and scraps of grains should be left inside for food. Take the time to lightly mist the soil every few days. Secure the aquarium with a tight-fitting lid because crickets are escape artists and will try to get away whenever you open the lid.
PREPARING TO EAT
Place in a colander your selection of crickets. Use cheesecloth or wire screening to quickly cover this and keep the insects contained. Run water over the top to rinse them thoroughly. Shake the excess water from the container. Seal the crickets in a container and place this in the freezer for 15 minutes. While this length of time will be enough to kill the crickets, it will not be enough time to freeze them. Take them out of the freezer and rinse the crickets once more. Depending on your personal preference, the legs, wing cases and heads can be removed. The legs can be painful to swallow and will sometimes get stuck in the teeth. Crickets can be consumed raw, but they can also be dehydrated or roasted and incorporated into your recipes.
TAKE PRECAUTIONS
Be careful when selecting crickets for food. Avoid those found near or in residential areas as these might have been exposed to chemical insecticides or herbicides.
Below Ray Mears demonstrates using a can as a fishing reel.
It's towards the end of this short video:
COOKING WITH A DUTCH OVEN
You needn’t forsake your favorite roasted or baked foods when cooking over an open fire. It is possible that your favorite recipes are given an enhanced flavor when using this method. For open fire cooking use a Dutch oven with feet and a lid with a rim.
STIR WITH A WOODEN SPOON
Metal spoons shouldn’t be used on the inside of a seasoned cast iron pot. Metal will damage the seasoned coating, so use wood instead.
A COOK’S FIRE
Build a hot fire using hard wood at least an hour prior to the time you wish to begin cooking. Avoid commercial charcoal or resinous (soft) wood as a fuel. Pine is an example of resinous, cool-burning, soft wood that produces a quantity of black soot when burned. This residue makes a mess of your cookware, builds up a hazardous film inside your chimney, and isn’t very pleasant for the cook. I don’t use charcoal briquettes for my cook fire because of the chemical additives and binders used to manufacture the product. Learning how to build a hardwood fire will keep you from dealing with either of these difficulties. Check to be sure you’ve gotten a good bed of red hot coals laid. An oven mitt or heat resistant cloth can serve to protect your hands from the heat while a curved piece of iron can serve as your lid-lifter.
HOW TO PREHEAT
Use a clean cloth or paper towel to coat the inside of your pot and lid with olive oil. Set the lid onto the pot and set it near the fire to warm while you prepare your ingredients. This is pre-heating your Dutch oven just as you would a modern standard oven. The oil penetrates the iron as the pot is warmed, making the vessel ready to cook. Securing the lid will keep ash out of the interior of the pot. If onions or peppers are part of the recipe, add them to the oven while it warms so that they may simmer and create a barrier between the rest of the food when it is added and the bottom of the pot.
PLACING FOOD INTO YOUR OVEN
Assemble the ingredients for your recipe. Remember the seasonings. The pre-heated oven should be moved away from the heat of the fire. A curved metal rod is useful as a tool to carefully remove the hot lid.
The remaining ingredients should be layered into your oven at this point. If rice is part of your recipe, add it and the water or broth at this point. Vegetables are next to be added. The meat rests on top of any vegetables, rice or potatoes so that it may flavor them as it cooks. Take care that the pot is not overfilled so that the food touches the underside of the lid. If cooking a bread or desert, layer the ingredients in the same way you would if using a conventional oven. Place the lid back onto the pot.
PLACING THE OVEN TO THE COALS
Shovel a small pile of hot coals to the edge of the fire. This method is less hazardous than attempting to set the pot over leaping flames or into the middle of the fire pit. Rest the Dutch oven on this small pile and then shovel more hot coals onto the lid. After you’ve gotten a good even coating of hot coals beneath and on top of your oven shovel some ash around the base and sprinkle it over the top. This procedure is known as banking the fire. The coals will retain their heat and burn slowly as they aren’t exposed to the air.
Your cooking time should be similar to the time used in a modern kitchen oven or a little longer if your coals are cool. When finished, remove the live coals from the lid of your pot using a shovel. Use a fire-resistant brush to remove any remaining debris. Remove the pot from the hot coals and move it back from the fire. Raise the lid and set it aside using a heavy piece of curved metal. Examine your food for doneness. Serve with a wooden spoon if the food has finished cooking. If more time is needed, recover the pot with the lid and replace it onto the small bed of coals scooping more coals back onto the top. After a few minutes, check the food.
It’s okay if your first effort results in a few burnt edges. With practice you’ll learn how to avoid this. A few burnt edges will quickly be overlooked by those that have been enjoying the aroma of your food during cooking. Seldom are there any leftovers. Your guests will be more than ready to eat.
CLEANING AND STORING
After removing the food from your Dutch oven, wipe residue from the inside using a soft sided scrub pad, paper towel or wooden spoon. As your pot becomes better seasoned, you’ll find that a paper towel will likely be enough to remove any bits of food. In the event you find that you have some food that has become glued to the pot, set the oven next to the fire to reheat and cook those to ash. Dutch ovens should not be run through dishwashers or submerged in dishwater. Heating the metal in hot water and detergents will strip it of its protective seasoning. Wipe your cleaned pot with oil to recoat it between uses. You will know you’ve done a nice job when you can see your reflection in the bottom of the pot. Seat the lid on the pot for storage.
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The following video is a demonstration of bread-making using a Dutch oven. While the footage shows use in a conventional oven, the technique is the same -- except for the fact that you'd be using fire as your heat source as described above:
