Aboard English ships of the Age of Sail, meals were not served as 'starter-main-dessert' but as rations regulated by the whistle. The crew was divided into 'messes' of six to eight men sharing a common bowl. The ship's cook prepared everything on the single galley stove. The rhythm followed the watches: biscuit and salted meat every day, the famous pudding (duff) on Sundays, and a ration of grog morning and evening. Everything had to keep for months without spoiling, hence the omnipresence of salt and drying.

At sea, salt is king: it saves meat from rotting on voyages lasting months. Beef and pork traveled drowned in brine at the bottom of barrels, and biscuit was baked twice to drive out all moisture. It was this harsh, salty preserved cuisine that haunted the stomachs of the sailors Davy Jones awaited.