Hardtack

Definitions

A large, hard biscuit made from unleavened flour and water; formerly used as a long-term staple food aboard ships.

countable, uncountable

Equivalents

Examples

“Meronym: reefer's nut”

“Philander went into the next room[…]and came back with a salt mackerel that dripped brine like⟳ a rainstorm. Then he put⟳ the coffee pot on the stove and rummaged out a loaf of dry bread and some hardtack.”

“Bread and fodder had to be brought up over longer and longer distances, it was more difficult all the time, transport⟳ was lacking, the army had already eaten two-thirds of its hardtack, exhausted men were marching in baking heat along sandy roads into emptiness!”

CEFR level