Alaskan readers in particular will be familiar with Sailor Boy Pilot Bread, made by Interbake Foods. (If you don't know it, read this blog article for more information.)
I've been trying to find a local source for them, but nobody in Tennessee seems to carry them. (Sams Club advertises them online, but only as an in-store purchase, and the local SC doesn't keep them in stock.) Does anyone know a good online supplier for these things, preferably one that doesn't charge too horrible a price? They've also got to ship countrywide, not just within Alaska. Alternatively, if you can get it in your area, what does it cost? Would you be prepared to send me a decent-size shipment of the stuff?
I've compared alternative pilot bread and hardtack suppliers, but they're almost always very expensive on a cost-per-ounce or cost-per-cracker basis. The cheapest on that basis that I've been able to find is Mountain House with their #10 cans containing 70 pilot bread crackers, but those who know it tell me it's not the same as the 'real thing'. I wouldn't know, of course.
Can anyone help? Many thanks in advance! Please leave any information you can provide in Comments, or e-mail me (my address is in my blog profile).
Peter
These are pretty common in Seattle area grocery stores. Too bad Amazon doesn't have them.
ReplyDeleteAmazon DID have them at one time. The shipping on them though was atrocious.
ReplyDeleteTry this link though if you haven't already.
http://stores.homestead.com/bentscookiefactory/Categories.bok?category=Hardtack+%26+Crackers
Damn son, these things are spendy.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.mredepot.com/servlet/the-827/sailor-boy-pilot-bread/Detail
yer welcome, Bing is your friend.
Their official distributor seems to be Span Alaska, which offers shipping via UPS to the Continental US and worldwide. I might hit them up myself, thanks for the lead!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.spanalaskasales.com/shop/about.html
Darn--I'd forgotten all about those. Now I want some. Thanks for passing along the nutritional equivallent of an earworm!
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure my local grocery store has this, I'll check tomorrow. If they don't I'm sure that I can find it in Astoria, I'll check there when I go across on Tue. I will get back to you on price.heaxcb
ReplyDeleteGreat memories of Alaska... drunks passed out in the snow clutching an empty bottle of R&R "whiskey" and a half-eaten Pilot Bread (tooth) cracker.
ReplyDeleteUgh. If I never smell one of those after being dipped in seal oil gone rancid again, it'll be too soon.
ReplyDeleteI'll put up with pilot bread in the house, as it's fine with peanut butter or a chowder, but if you start looking for a seal oil source, I am introducing you to Oleg's couch. Never again. Not enough alcohol in the world.
What's the proper name for the horrific concoction of blubber chunks and rancid seal oil/blood? Sounds like 'mikkiyuk' or close?
DeleteSaw it lots of places on the Slope, and usually mistook it for honeybucket contents.
Have you tried oyster crackers instead?
ReplyDeleteAFAIK they still make them, Try the Cracker/Chip/Cookie aisle.
Or cook up your own,
RHB