Lobscouse, Hardtack & Navy Sea Cooks 

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I watch Tasting History every day while I eat lunch. Now my toddler won’t start eating until we turn on “histy!” She gets so excited when she hears the opening music. Thanks Max!

The “hard tack!” Clack-clack honestly gets me every time 🏴‍☠️

Truly, the hardtack cut to you clacking them together literally never fails to make me smile

I still have one of my great-grandfather's hardtack biscuits from WW1. He kept it as a souvenir as he had just left a trench area and entered a dugout, got the biscuit out of a tin and just then, where he had been standing, a minenwerfer round exploded. He thereafter regarded this hardtack as his 'lucky piece' and indeed, he and the hardtack did survive the war.

And the crowd goes wild. Round of applause *Clack clack*

can't believe we got a hardtack and asafetida reference in the same episode. The Tasting History lore is really coming together 👀

The hard tack (clack, clack) will NEVER get old. It is now iconic. I, literally, LOL every 👏single 👏time👏!

Lobscows (Welsh spelling) was also a staple stew for landlubbers along the north wales coast and Liverpool (hence the nickname ‘scousers’ for a Liverpudlian). I’m sure there must have been a myriad of receipt, but the one I inherited (from Anglesey) was for cubed stewing beef or lamb simmered in water seasoned with salt and pepper, with onions, swede and carrots, and dumplings made of beef suet, flour and water added for the final 20 minutes. It always tastes better reheated the second day with fresh dumplings.

Lapskaus is still eaten in Norway! Usually made with beef, potatoes and root vegetables, it's served with flatbrød(flatbread) that is made from water and barley flour. The flatbread is usually dipped or used almost like a spoon for the lapskaus.

It occurs to me that this channel may indeed be nothing more than an elaborate Pavlov's Dog experiment. Max has trained all of us to expect the clack clack anytime he says "hardtack." And, like the good doggy that I am, I delightedly tune in every week for fascinating food, a history lesson, and if I've been a very good boy all week maybe, juuuuuuust maybe, I'll get a clack, clack.

I really appreciated how you took the time to discuss the disability angle. It's very rare to see the roles of historical disabled people mentioned outside of discussions about institutions/medicine. Many assume that historically, disabled people always just died, lived on the streets, or were institutionalized. Not always the case, as can be seen here!

I love the hardtack bit, NEVER GETS OLD! NEVER STOP DOING IT! Cracks me up every time and its cool inside joke to regulars of the channel.

The caboose on a train was where the crew rested and cooked their meals. It got its name from the caboose on ships because of the stove.

Not only do we get lots of *clack clack* but we get a new *clack clack*?!? Max has smiled upon us! Seriously though, the history of stews fascinate me because on the one hand its just cooking food in liquid but on the other hand, there are sooooo many different variations of something like a beef stew. I mean who doesn't have a relative's recipe that they swear by? That difference and variation is just so fascinating.

I'm from Argentina and here stores sell "galletas marineras" or "sailor's biscuits" (I guess), my great grandma loved them and they're popular between vegans because they're just flour and water. They're definetely not as hard as hardtack, you can eat them on their own and don't have that much shelf life but are very dry and thin. I never knew what they had to do with sailors unitl I started watching your videos but it makes sense that they could be some kind of adaptation from hardtack that people made once they were settled, considering our population is made mainly from european inmigrants who came in very long trips on ships. Anyway, I hope you read my comment 😊😊. I love your channel and I love how you always match the tiny stuffed animal to the videos. ♥♥♥

The *clack clack* with Max’s goofy smile gets me every time 😂

That's still a thing! Here in Germany you can get Labskaus, both fresh and canned, which is basically this, ft. added beets, mashed to a completely disgusting-looking but absolutely delicious... well, mash, frequently garnished with a fried egg and/or pickles and/or fresh fish. Looks like puke on a plate, but it's savory and filling and *good*.

Four? Four hard tack "clack clacks"? We have been blessed! Also, I appreciate you calling this a one pot meal. It made it me really happy for whatever reason.

i literally cried out "YEAH!" when I saw the clip of you tapping the hardtack, it's the simple things in life :)

Ohhh my goodness!!!! My family still eat a very similar recipe just called "Scouse", given that we live near Merseyside I never questioned it but - it's really great to see my own living heritage be represented in a way that I genuinely learn something!!! Thank you for making my day Max! :))

As a proud Scouser (and long time viewer!!!), I can’t tell you how excited I was to see you do an episode about our “national” dish!! And I don’t mind telling you, I completely geeked out when you gave a nod to our city’s association with the dish. Just as a point of interest, although we dont use hardtack any more, Scouse is invariably served with hard “crusty bread” and beetroot (which is also a key ingredient of labskaus in Hamburg, another city with a Beatles connection!). Amazing content as always Max, you are a treasure!

I don’t know which I like better, the clack-clack sound of hardtack or Max’s facial expression when he claps them together 😄

Hi, i live in Germany and Labskaus is very famous North German food. The ingrediens are: Potatos, Onion, Cored Beef and beetroot. It is served with a Fried Egg on top and a "Rollmops" (rolled fillet of marinated herring)

Labskaus ist also a Dish, I grew Up on. My Mother comes from Rostock, which was a verry Prominent Port in Germany. Thank you ☺️

Scouse!!! The National dish of Liverpool ❤ Literally just finished a big pot I made last week. The reason Liverpudlians are called 'Scousers' or 'Scouse' is because the Sailors/Dockers were known for enjoying Lobscouse so much they got the nickname from others due to this preference for this hearty meal.

Here in Rauma, Finland, "lapskoussi" is still a common sight. Many lunch spots serve it once a week. Grocery stores in the area also sell it in 1 kg buckets. There's no hardtack (clack clack!) in it, but it's thickened with potatoes.

I just finished making Lobscouse as per your recipe. Dude, , AWESOME!!! I gave some of my hardtack to my friend. I challenged him to use it as well. Thank you again for the awesome recipe. And your book rocks!!

Max, greetings! Terry from Huntington Beach here. I'm a former "sea cook" in the US Navy - an MS on the USS TARAWA LHA-1 (crew of 5000 sailors and Marines while underway). I retired from the culinary industry 7 years ago after cheffing for 30 years. I've been enjoying your channel for about the last 6 months or so. I love how you give the recipe interpretations then whip a little history on us. I'm going to give this Lobscouse dish a go this weekend. Like very hearty and filling, something for a good voyage or a brisk Winter's night's meal. If ya ever head down to OC, give me a dollar. We can swap seafaring recipes and anecdotes.

In Liverpool nearly every family has their own recipe for Scouse, also it is commonly made in one large pan as the poor often wouldn't have frying pans or multiple pots available. You just throw it all in for a long, slow stew, skimming off the foamy top till it's gone. It's not unusual to cook it to eat the next day as it often tastes better and better each day you reheat it. Traditionally its a cheap beef cut cubed (one that can take a long stew and still hold its shape ), potatoes, carrots, onion and optional bacon. Any other veg or meat type makes it an Irish stew. Then enjoy with lovely piece of crusty bread to mop up and often pickled red cabbage or beetroot on the side. Most families have their own seasoning combinations and flavour additives (for example Worcester sauce, OXO cube or herbs) often guarded and handed down as a secret recipe.

It's already been mentioned in the comments that in Denmark, it is called Skipperlabskovs. It is the signature dish of the Tivoli restaurant "Grøften". Here it is a meat and potato stew. The meat can be any meat but salt pork is probably the most common. Apart from salt, the seasoning is white pepper and bay leaves. The potatoes are boiled out, not mashed. But as in much Danish food, the real secret is in the toppings. You need chopped chives, cold dices of butter, pickled red beets, Worchestershire Sauce and perhaps also or alternatively brown sauce (like H.P. Sauce). Some have ketchup and mustard, too, but to me, that is a bit over the top. And buttered whole grain rye bread on the side for texture. You also need snaps and beer. Danish food often seems bland at first glance, but it comes to life with the different toppings and condiments and the combination of sharp and gentle beverages. I have a historical cookbook, but not here, and it will take a while before I can find it, but to cut it short, there was a common North Sea culture, encompassing Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Western Germany and The Netherlands, and they have a lot of recipes and other cultural stuff in common, albeit with local twists. The culture was still alive when I was a kid in the 60s and 70s, but as shipping and fishing methods changed, the culture almost died out. I could speak a Yorkshire Dialect in Vendsyssel, and be understood. Now both regions share a great understanding of American English.

My 10 year old daughter begged me to put this on while we were eating dinner, and of course I had to oblige. Thank you Max for making history so appealing and appetizing (and a couple glasses of wine make it even more so!)

I honestly don't think that the *Clack Clack* every time Hardtack is mentioned will ever get old for me

Has it really been three years since the hard tack video was made?? Good grief, where did all that time go- I remember watching that one when it was put up! Then again, I also remember watching the very first Garum video when it first went up, too! It's interesting that Max says his lobscouse reminds him of the Irish Stew he made, for this, too can be traced back to Liverpool. This was the port where I guess Irish men landed to work in England and the rest of the UK... and there was a large number of them come over to build both the canals and the railway networks. They are even recorded as a specific group, known as the Navvies, and their presence can be found in the many folk songs that come from in and around Liverpool. What's not to say that some of these Irish folk got chatting to ships' cooks on the Irish Sea crossing, and ended up exchanging favourite recipes along the way?

I look forward to your videos every Tuesday! My 1 year olds, I put a Playlist on of your videos during the day. Everytime the sound of time for history plays my daughter immediately is glued. My mother in law and her mom has fallen in love with your videos and both bought your cook book now. They love watching when they come over. Them being from England they love seeing those recipes ❤ thank you for what you do!

What a breath of fresh air this channel is! When the world is falling apart, this is a safe place! ❤ thank you!

I’m super excited to see all the future hard tack “Clack Clack’s”! I can see it now old clacks then new clacks! I honestly would be devastated if I heard him say “Hard tack” without the cut away! My favorite part of the videos 😂!

We still eat "labskaus" in Germany to this day. It's a staple food on the menus of practically all traditional northern German restaurants (German dishes). It's also often made at home. I personally cook its at last once a year. The recipe is a bit different and it now contains pickled beed (especially the juice), pickles and pickled herring. We don't use hardtack and only the corned beef these days though. It's eaten with fried eggs. Edit. We also eat it mashed.

We still make it in Germany its made with corned beef, picked cucumber and potatoes it is topped with a fried egg my father in law used to work as a cook on a fishing trawler and used to make it quite often some people serve it with pickled herring . Apparently thats why people from Liverpool are called Scousers 👍😍I Its a national dish on the German coast and their islands 👍

As a former hospital corpsman, I'd love to see a video dedicated more to loblolly's history, especially one including it's associations with sickbays and the loblolly boys.

Love this video, I’m a very proud scouser myself and can confirm that we still eat Scouse and blind Scouse in the city today - and we LOVE it and are so proud of it!!! It’s a little different and more gravy/stock based with more vegetables - turnips and stuff if you’re posh!! - and we have it with pickled veg like cabbage or beetroot - also if you’re posh - love Scouse!!!!!

I live in Liverpool among the wonderful Scousers (nicest , funniest people you'd ever want to meet) and I've had scouse countless times in my 25 years here and it's rarely the same twice but it's always amazing. It usually consists of whatever you have available to to you; whatever is cheap at the market that day- carrots, onions, lamb or beef (flour the meat before you cook it to help thicken the stew), potatoes, bacon (much thicker here than in the US) are standard ingredients. It's not unusual to keep a pot of scouse going and just add to it over time. It freezes well and it's a hearty, warming, filling comfort food. A crusty bread on the side rather than hard tack might be a bit easier to make if you don't have any in hand. Lee, honourary Scouser

In case you wondering, the hard tack thing is still delightful. Always makes me smile.

Please never stop the hardtack running gag on this channel I love it so much 😂

My mum was from Birkenhead so scouse is a childhood comfort food of mine. She always made it with stewing beef and cooked it in a pressure cooker so it was super tender. Sometimes we'd have it with suet dumplings, which was always the my fav version.

I'm from Liverpool (UK) and we're known as 'scousers', nice to see my homeland getting a mention on one of my favourite RU-vid channels.

In the Patrick O'Brian books the ship's surgeon sometimes uses asafoetida in his medicines, so the sailors know they have been properly dosed.

Dear Max & Crew, you are loved and appreciated. Thank you for this great video!

Winco Foods here in the States sells sea biscuits in their bulk food section and I have some stored for emergencies! There is a movie "17 Miracles" where a pioneer mother experiences a sacred moment with these hard tack biscuits that helps her family survive a terrible journey west, I was privileged to meet that Mother's Great Granddaughter, who heard the story from her Great Grandma's own lips. So special.

I loved your episode on Fannie Farmer and disabled women cooks. Glad to know disabled sailors on ships were still getting paid, even though they couldn't climb rigging.

Lapskaus is a Norwegian stew with diced potatoes, carrots, leeks, kohlrabi, and parsley root. You make it with stock and also diced beef or pork. It was interesting how the name of that dish sounds like how you say lapskaus in Norwegian.

I love how you choose so many recipes that include a connection to hardtack (tock tock)

In Norway it's called lapskaus. It's an ancient dish that is still popular and cozy to eat in the winter!

See also "The Potteries - Lobby" Stoke On Trent is far from the sea, but we've eaten this dish for hundreds of years and still do here. We call it Lobby which is a variation on the Lobscouse name, and it was eaten here by the poor Staffordshire Pottery workers as cheap food. It is one of our local dishes that every family knows & eats, along with the delicious Staffordshire Oatcakes (a soft oat pancake wrap unique to the area that is often eaten topped with grilled cheese)

Max 🥹 I've been wanting you to do a video on "Scouse" for ages. Really glad to see you have done the origin video of it. This is where us scousers get our name from. I love how food has so much culture and history and how it connects different parts of the world together ❤

Loved this one! I really enjoy learning about different historical stews thanks so much for all of your hard work :)

The hardtack clacks never get old. ❤

US Navy in late 1960's and I'm very grateful for our ship's cooks after watching this episode. Food was great! I appreciate all the research and writing you put into your channel. Thank you!

**Clack Clack** 3:39 its always music to My ears and we got a new one! THANKS MAX! YOU'RE THE BEST 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

I am from Liverpool😀🇬🇧, our accent is called Scouse! Because of the stew😀 Mum made our scouse from leftovers from sunday roast, preferably lamb, potatoes, carrots, parsnip, barley, cooked down over many hours, add Extra spuds ( potatoe) the original comfort food😀. Any leaftovers made into a scouse pie😀 yum!!

My wife grew up on the Baltic Sea coast in northern Germany. There the traditional way of cooking it is as a hash, with no water. You start with the bacon and potatoes and then add in the corned beef. It also includes the addition of red beets and pickled herring, including the juice, which are part of the simmer in the frying pan. It’s then serviced with fried eggs.

Interesting, in Germany Labskaus contains gherkins as well. Oh, and no hardtack. Just gherkins, potatoes and salt beef. Modern recipes go something like this: Boil potatoes and peel them, make mash using the liquid from the gherkins. Chop gherkins and potted meat and mix with the mashed potatoes. You can add butter and salt if you want to. You can also use pickled beetroot instead of the gherkins. Serve with pickled herring and fried egg.

Now you've done rubaboo, hellfire stew, lobscouse & Irish stew it would be lovely if you could do traditional "Stovies" from Scotland. (If you do please don't do the imitation one with corned beef - that's just a hash). Proper stovies, with the leftover from a roast/drippings. A very humble dish, but one close to my heart. A winter staple & one we traditionally had every Guy Fawkes night after the fireworks served with oatcakes, skirlie & pickled beetroot.🎆😋

As a history major, I really enjoy your videos. FYI, I'm from Newfoundland, Canada and hard tack (aka Hard bread) is still made commercially in this province and a regular part of Newfoundland cuisine. We use it in a dish called Fish and Brews, made with salt cod.

My uncle has worked on US river grain barges practically his whole life. It's hard work, and he got injured about 10 years ago. Back and knees are pretty much shot. But he's now a cook for one of these barges lol

That's a very interesting comment on copper versus cast iron, especially since many people think of iron as an upgrade to copper. This shows one of the ways in which that was not true. ALSO! New hardtack clip?! NEW HARDTACK CLIP!

I'm from Stoke-on-Trent, I grew up eating Lobby which is our local variant of Lobscouse, specifically a variant that uses Pearl Barley instead of hard tack. I always assumed we inherited it from Liverpudlian immigrants during the Inudstrial revolution but it sounds more like we got it from "Lob lolly" from the West Country. Also find it bizzare to think this dish spread as far florida. Thanks so much for focusing on a bit of Northern English history!

Many years ago, I made hardtack and lobscouse for a pirate festival (like a Renaissance faire, but all pirates!). Boy, do I wish I had your instructions for making hardtack back then, the directions I had were far more complicated, involving rolling it flat and folding it numerous times. Like a phyllo dough from Hades.

We eat this in Norway! without the hardtack of course. we call it Lapskaus! :D commonly we use sausage, Pork leg hocks, carrots, potatoes, leek and some other vegetables. sometimes we use different meat. it all depends on what we have in the house :) My family usually has it with thin pancakes on the side.

Hands down my favorite channel. The perfect marriage of cooking and history.

Ah, love scouse, especially served with pickled red cabbage. Favourite dish of Liverpool!

I've always been interested in the Napoleonic war at sea, and it's truly wonderful to have this insight, an actual recipe! Scrolling thru the comments I see many people who are into the novels of Patrick O'brien. Highly recommended, they're REAL page turners. The best one to start with is HMS Surprise. Nice one Max! ⭐👍

In Patrick O'Brian's book series on the adventures of Royal Naval Officer Jack Aubrey and Dr Maturin the meal of Lobscouse is often mentioned. There's even a cookbook based on the meals mentioned in the series called "Lobscouse and spotted Dog."

We need a compilation of everytime the hard tack joke has been used!

Fun fact. Eight Avenue in Brooklyn New York used to be called colloquially “Lapskaus Boulevard” because of the high Norwegian-American population there.

The dish is how us scousers from Liverpool got our name! Scouse is still a food we eat a lot here and is gorgeous. Mum loves it with beetroot.

In Norway, "Lapskaus" (both light and dark versions) is still a staple of our cuisine. Guess most seafaring nations have their version of this dish :) I even believe a street in Brooklyn, NY was called Lapskaus Boulevard for a time...

It's funny you mention the Irish stew because it really is super similar. And the version you mentioned about adding grains instead of hardtack in Liverpool (incidentally where I lot of Irish went) is almost exactly like Irish stew. Kind of nice how even in different areas people enjoyed similar food 😊 Also, love little Staryu in the back ❤❤

I die laughing whenever I see the hardtack edit-the expression on his face when he’s clacking them together is priceless 😂😂😂 It looks delicious!

I'm not that into food, I hardly ever cook, but for some reason I've enjoyed several of your really interesting and informative historical food videos

The "Max Miller" drinking game just has a new entry: take a shot every time you hear **Clack Clack** :)

Thanks! My father used to be a sailor already during the sailing ship era, and it was often we had lapskoussi (Finnish version) at home. Just meat, lots of (half smashed) potatoes and butter. That was good. I used to spice it richly with ketchup. My father was not a cook steward, but a captain, yet it was most often his job to make this dish in our family. - For some odd reason, it is not so commonplace food on ships nowadays.... 🤔

The clack clack of hardtack is one of my favorite recurring bits. It always makes me smile. I still can’t believe how loud it is.

Ohhh, in Finland we have a beef/potato stew called lapskoussi. How amazing that it shares this long, international history of seafaring food! Apparently, lapskoussi is traditional in the port city of Rauma, and I can totally see how it must've gotten there 😄

contemperary "Labskaus" which is a regional dish in coastal Germany has a similar base, but also includes beetroot and gherkins and is served with pickled hering and an egg sunny side up. ... all things which can be easily taken on a ship trip.

My dad was a civil war re-enacted and they would make hardtack for demonstrations in sample size. Conveniently it was about the size of long rifle ball, so during one of the after season parties they shot some of the leftovers at pumpkins LOL

This is eaten in Liverpool. You add oxo stock, cabbage, carrots and whatever vegetables you got. You add Worcester’s sauce if you got it, a bayleaf and some other spice (I like thyme) and whatever spices you want just don’t overdo it. Add crusty bread and some pickled cabbage (the red kind). I personally like this with a pint of Guinness too or some claret

I'm so happy that this was an episode, though a different version, no one around me knew what I was saying, asking 'what the hell is Lobscouse?', I always had to explain it as a potato and meat stew. xD So, I want to thank you, for doing this video. Now I can just send people here when they ask me what Lobscouse is. :) In case you're curious, my history with it; Over 25 years ago (I'm 32 now), I had my great grandmother come to Australia from Norway to visit. Her son - my grandfather - was a fisherman, and was most of his life. He even sailed the sea from Norway to here, over 60 years ago, obviously stopping at many docks on his way here. When great grandma came, she showed my grandmother her version of Lobscouse - Celery, Shallots/Spring Onions, (peeled) Potatoes, (peeled) Carrots, and Rump Steak. Add some beef stock ro the water, and let simmer for 8 hours, stirring every half hour for the first two hours, then every hour after, scraping the bottom. It's a dish I still enjoy to this day. Though I've had to change the cutting sizes, as she always said 'smaller', as if it was the only english words she knew, it was cute. :) So the sizes were usually smaller than 1cm. I've made the potatoes and steak bite size now, but everything else still tastes the same.

I cannot describe the joy of not only having hardtack in the title but multiple *clack clack*s! ❤❤❤

Max, you are honestly one of the most charismatic people on here. I love learning from you! Your passion is so evident; it's palpable. Always happy to see you make a post! I would 100% love to see what videos you have that weren't posted. Even if there's no food related to the subject, I'd be hitting that rewatch button on spam! Keep up the fantastic and beautiful content my teacher and friend❤

The clack-clack sound of hard tack gives me so much joy. I was giggling while you were making a fresh batch. Never stop clacking your hard tack! Its iconic to you.

I gotta say, I've been binging for almost two weeks; The hardtack bit has yet to get old

Well, it sure doesn't resembler the Swedish Lapskojs as you say, as it's more of a mash with pieces of beef in it. It does however have similarities to the dish Sjömansbiff (Sailors steak), but then you just add beef, so no bacon etc and boil the beef, onions and potatoes in layers in beer (preferably porter) and some stock plus some herbs. It's quite a treat and easy to make.

My kids, when younger, had a nice DK book on Vikings with a cutaway of a longship. This illustration was printed on clear plastic so you could peel back the decks and see inside. At the same time I was into Patrick O'Brian's Naval historical fiction. The naval stores of the Viking ship were very similar to those on board a British warship of the Napoleonic period. With the Vikings sailing over to invade eastern England, the Danelaw, it seems highly likely that lobskous could have been introduced at that time. O'Brian also mentions asafoetida as an apothecary ingredient of that time.

Since that episode was published I have made the Irish stew for our family every St. Patrick's day. It's delicious!

Every ride home from work I listen to Tasting History and I’ve gotten accustomed to it now, I’ve learned a lot. Helps me stay awake too lol

I want to start a drinking game. Watch Tasting History episodes for several hours and do a shot every time a hard tack “shot” gets played. 😀

Lobscouse is a beautiful word to say Sailing from port to bay Diced beef, potato, onions and bacon Seaborne kitchen, waves forsaken Keeping a crew in rude health While searching the seas for new wealth Creating bowls of hearty meals For storms, high winds and damaged sails.

Ordered my signed cookbook and can't wait for it to arrive. My daughter and I thoroughly enjoy watching your channel. We'd love to see you do a series of recipes based on Downton Abbey!! THANKS

Wow! I just ate labskaus in Hamburg. Specifically, a German friend recommended it as blue collar fare of the Hamburger fishermen and sailors. They serve it with beets and as more of a hash with pickled herring.