Autumn harvest of the Native Americans

Nathaniel Whitmore
Posted 8/21/12

As a lifelong lover of pumpkin pie, I was delighted to learn that the main squash of the Lenape was pumpkin. The Lenni Lenape (Delaware) Indians were quite agricultural, with a focus (like many …

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Autumn harvest of the Native Americans

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As a lifelong lover of pumpkin pie, I was delighted to learn that the main squash of the Lenape was pumpkin. The Lenni Lenape (Delaware) Indians were quite agricultural, with a focus (like many Native gardeners) on the “three sisters:” corn, beans and squash. These three staple crops supported Native American culture over much of the country.

When others attempted to utilize corn as a staple grain, they would suffer from pellagra—a niacin or vitamin B3 deficiency. Natives avoided such deficiency by cooking their corn with wood ash or lime stone, which rendered the corn more digestible, including the niacin within.

Many staples were also gleaned from the wild. Acorns were a staple in the Upper Delaware (as they were in many other parts of the world). Acorns, of course, are the distinct seeds of oaks, which are of several different varieties. Generally, white oaks are the species with round-tipped leaf lobes. Red oaks are those with pointed lobes. These two groups are also differentiated by their fruiting, with white oaks potentially producing acorns every year and red oaks every other year.

In my experience our region is home most commonly to white oak (Quercus alba), northern red oak (Q. rubra), and chestnut oak (Q. montana). We also have scarlet oak, black oak, pin oak, and scrub oak; along with other species and natural hybrids. Acorns vary in astringency from species to species and due to other variables. For humans to consume, the astringency (due to tannic acid) must be leached. The easiest method is to peel off the shells, crack into smaller pieces and cover with water. A couple times a day, change the water, testing the astringency by taste (bitter and dry) as you go. When they are nearly leached, do a couple changes of water on the stove to speed up the finishing and bring out the flavor.

There are many ways to use cooked acorns in recipes or just eat them plain. One interesting method Native Americans used was to place a basket of acorns in a stream to let the moving water wash the tannins away. One time I tried this by placing a sack of hulled acorns in a stream. The stream froze over and some kind of creature (perhaps a squirrel) walked the ice and chewed a hole in the bag to remove the acorns. The friends that helped me shell the acorns were not pleased with such a result. I, too, was disappointed to lose such a tasty food, but such is the tuition for learning about nearly forgotten practices of old.

Besides the ash treatment of corn, Natives maintained a balanced diet with niacin-containing foods like acorns, along with pumpkin seeds, hickory nuts and walnuts.

Of course, one tragedy of our forests has been the near-loss of what was once the source of a primary staple of eastern North America—the American chestnut. I imagine autumn must have been a very tasty place when the forests were filled with an abundance of chestnuts. Corn would have been flavored and balanced nutritionally by boiling with game, beans, pumpkin and chestnuts.

Perhaps readers feel differently, but for me, it is significant and amazing that each season produces foods that are appropriate nutritionally and energetically with the season and that humans have been able to discover the correct preparation (such as to boil corn with ashes) of these foods in order to turn ingredients into health-promoting meals. Oftentimes indigenous forms of dietary theory seem strange or superstitious and are disregarded, such as the stigma against meat while menstruating that is found in many Native American traditions. Though foreign to moderners, many indigenous theories related to diet are quite sound and logical, especially in that they are rooted in a close relationship with the earth and her cycles. Traditional harvest foods like grains, beans, roots, seeds and hearty fruits have long been associated with the season. It is only natural, of course, but also wonderful that foods high in fat, protein, carbohydrates and a warming energy should appear in autumn when the creatures of nature are fattening in preparation for the cold.

One of the most important theories of Native nutrition is that of the Doctrine of Signatures, which holds that perceivable qualities (signatures) of various foods can serve as indications of their properties. For instance, walnuts have a wrinkly appearance and form in lobes in such a way that they look like a brain. Modern nutrition confirms that they are good for the brain due to their high fatty-acid content. Pumpkin seeds are used to treat the prostate, a use that was approved by the German Commission E (the German government’s equivalent to our Food and Drug Administration). That a seed’s qualities affect the reproductive system is an example of the Doctrine of Signatures.

The dentist, Weston Price, traveled the world and observed (photographing teeth as he did) that indigenous diets promoted healthy teeth and that once cultures were “contaminated” with industrialized foods such as refined flour, sugar and vegetable oil, their teeth suffered from cavities and wisdom tooth compaction. His documentation of teeth in the mouths of those who were still eating traditional foods compared to those influenced by industrialized foods serves as evidence that Native cultures understood the general principles of sound nutrition. I think it is safe to assume that such an understanding must come largely through an intimacy with the natural world.

I sincerely feel that corn muffins and pumpkin pie (two of my life-long favorite foods) taste so good largely because they are foods of this part of the earth. Unfortunately, most muffins and pies of today are filled with industrialized food ingredients that are harmful to health. Because of the work involved, people today rarely make pumpkin pie from scratch. Instead, fresh pumpkins are mostly carved into jack-o-lanterns. However, it is important for the sake of our health to maintain traditional cooking practices and to relearn them where they have been lost.

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