As long as the freezer is working, there will be no shortage of meat on the Clipper Stad Amsterdam. That was during the time of sailing cargo ships different.
There was no freezer, so the meat that went along was conserved by brining.
To have occasionally fresh meat, living animals were taken along to slaughter during the journey. Irving Johnson tells us a story about his trip on board of the “Peking”, the turkey became ill during the journey and was butchered before he could die before Christmas.

We got some poultry runs on the front side of the deckhouse of the Clipper Stad Amsterdam, and when occupied it should “produce” some fresh eggs. So we bought in the early years of the ship a few chicks, so we could get some fresh eggs.
When the chicks grew, we sadly realize we would never get fresh eggs.
The chicks were no chickens but roosters.

On board of the “Moshulu” they had a pigpen situated were we got our outside lavatory.
Our visit to Philadelphia showed that this pit was still at the same spot as was shown in the books of Eric Newby. This sailor described the affection of the animals and the grief when they had to be butchered. But nonetheless, nobody forgot to grab a piece of bacon.

It is the birthday of our quartermaster Daniel (Daniel Danish square), so there was cake during smoco. The cake was covered by a layer of pink marzipan, nobody could resist to knead it to something suitable.

This livestock had not a long life time…

Richard Slootweg
Captain Clipper Stad Amsterdam