The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Pemmican \Pem"mi*can\, n. [Written also pemican.]
   1. Among the North American Indians, meat cut in thin slices,
      divested of fat, and dried in the sun.
      [1913 Webster]

            Then on pemican they feasted.         --Longfellow.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Meat, without the fat, cut in thin slices, dried in the
      sun, pounded, then mixed with melted fat and sometimes
      dried fruit, and compressed into cakes or in bags. It
      contains much nutriment in small compass, and is of great
      use in long voyages of exploration.
      [1913 Webster]

   3. A treatise of much thought in little compass.
      [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

pemmican
    n 1: lean dried meat pounded fine and mixed with melted fat;
         used especially by North American Indians [syn: pemmican,
         pemican]