Country food Country food, in Canada, refers to the
traditional diets of the
Indigenous peoples in Canada (known in Canada as
First Nations,
Metis, and
Inuit), especially in remote
northern regions where
Western food is an expensive import, and
traditional foods are still relied upon. The Government of the
Northwest Territories estimated in 2015 that nearly half of Northwest Territories residents in smaller communities relied on country food for 75% of their meat and fish intake; in larger communities, the percentage was lower, with the lowest percentage relying on country foods (4%) being in
Yellowknife, the capital and only "large community". The most common country foods in the Northwest Territories area include mammals and birds (caribou, moose, ducks, geese, seals, hare, grouse, ptarmigan), fish (lake trout, char,
inconnu, whitefish, pike,
burbot) and berries (blueberries, cranberries, blackberries, cloudberries). In the eastern
Canadian Arctic, Inuit consume
a diet of foods that are fished, hunted, and gathered locally. This may include
caribou,
walrus,
ringed seal,
bearded seal,
beluga whale,
polar bear,
berries, and
fireweed. The cultural value attached to certain game species, and certain parts, varies. For example, in the
James Bay region, a 1982 study found that beluga whale meat was principally used as dog food, whereas the blubber, or
muktuk was a "valued delicacy". Value also varies by age, with Inuit preferring younger ring seals, and often using the older ones for dog food. Contaminants in country foods are a public health concern in Northern Canada; volunteers are tested to track the spread of industrial chemicals from emitters (usually in the South) into the northern food web via the air and water. In 2017, the Government of the Northwest Territories committed to using country foods in the soon-to-open Stanton Territorial Hospital, despite the challenges of obtaining, inspecting, and preparing sufficient quantities of wild game and plants. In
Southern Canada, wild foods (especially meats) are relatively rare in restaurants, due to
wildlife conservation rules against selling hunted meat, as well as strict
meat inspection rules. There is a
cultural divide between
rural and remote communities that rely on wild foods, and urban Canadians (the majority), who have little or no experience with them. and
maple sugar Eastern Native American cuisine The essential staple foods of the
Indigenous peoples of the Eastern Woodlands have traditionally been corn (also known as maize),
beans, and
squash, known as "
The Three Sisters" because they were planted interdependently: the beans grew up the tall stalks of the corn, while the squash spread out at the base of the three plants and provided protection and support for the root systems.
Maple syrup is another essential food staple of the Eastern Woodlands peoples. Tree sap is collected from sugar maple trees during the beginning of springtime when the nights are still cold. Birch bark containers are used in the process of making maple syrup, maple cakes, maple sugar, and maple taffy. When the sap is boiled to a certain temperature, different variations of maple food products are created. When the sap starts to thicken, it can be poured into the snow to make taffy. Since the first colonists of
New England had to adapt their foods to the local crops and resources, the Native influences of
Southern New England Algonquian cuisine form a significant part of
New England cuisine with dishes such as
cornbread,
succotash and
Johnnycakes and ingredients such as
corn,
cranberries and local species of
clam still enjoyed in the region today. The
Wabanaki tribal nations and other eastern woodlands peoples have made
nut milk and
infant formula made from nuts and cornmeal, while the Cherokee nation made
Kanuchi soup from hickory nuts.
Southeastern Native American cuisine Southeastern Native American culture has contributed to the formation of
Southern cuisine from its origins through the present day. From Southeastern Native American culture came one of the main staples of the Southern diet:
corn (maize), either ground into meal or limed with an alkaline salt to make
hominy, using a Native American technique known as
nixtamalization. Indigenous fishing methods in the Southeast include shooting with arrows, spearing or
gigging, trapping with
weirs or dams, poisoning with
fish toxins, bare-hand
noodling, and
netting. Fish were often roasted, while small or very bony fish were stewed for use in soup.
Livestock, adopted from Europeans, in the form of
hogs and
cattle, are also kept. Aside from the more commonly consumed parts of the animal, it is traditional to also eat organ meats such as
liver,
brains, and
intestines. Many of the early settlers were taught Southeastern Native American cooking methods.
Selected dishes •
Cornbread •
Hominy, coarsely ground corn used to make grits •
Hush puppy, small, savory, deep-fried round ball made from cornmeal-based batter • Indian fritter •
Kanuchi, soup made from ground hickory nuts •
Livermush, pig liver, parts of pig heads, cornmeal and spices • Sofkee, corn soup or drink, sour
Great Plains Native American cuisine Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies or
Plains Indians have historically relied heavily on
American bison (American buffalo) as a staple food source. One traditional method of preparation is to cut the meat into thin slices then dry it, either over a slow fire or in the hot sun, until it is hard and brittle. In this form it can last for months, making it a main ingredient to be combined with other foods, or eaten on its own. One such use could be
pemmican, a concentrated mixture of fat and protein, and fruits such as
cranberries,
Saskatoon berries,
blueberries,
cherries,
chokecherries, and
currants are sometimes added. Many parts of the bison were utilized and prepared in numerous ways, including: "boiled meat, tripe soup perhaps thickened with brains, roasted intestines, jerked/smoked meat, and raw kidneys, liver, tongue sprinkled with gall or bile were eaten immediately after a kill." The animals that Great Plains Indians consumed, like bison, deer, and antelope, were grazing animals. Due to this, they were high in
omega-3 fatty acids, an essential fatty acid that many diets lack. When asked to state traditional staple foods, a group of Plains elders identified prairie turnips (
Pediomelum esculentum, syn.
Psoralea esculenta), called timpsula or tin'psila in the Lakota language group; fruits (
chokecherries,
June berries,
plums,
blueberries,
cranberries,
strawberries,
buffalo berries,
gooseberries);
potatoes;
squash; dried meats (
venison,
buffalo,
jack rabbit, and
prairie chicken); and
wild rice as being these staple foods. "We landed at a Watlala village 200 men of Flatheads of 25 houses 50 canoes built of Straw, we were treated verry kindly by them, they gave us round root near the size of a hens egg roasted which they call Wap-to (wapato) to eate . . . . which they roasted in the embers until they became Soft" —William Clark, Lewis and Clark Expedition Wapato (
Sagittaria latifolia) has a number of varieties and is found growing in damp marsh area around ponds, lakes, rivers, and streams. The edible rhizomes were gathered and could be roasted in the embers of a fire, or dried, ground and the meal pressed into a cake which "served well as bread" as noted by Meriwether Lewis of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. They are known today as broadleaf arrowhead, arrowhead, duckroot, or duck-potato.
Western Indigenous cuisine In the
Pacific Northwest, traditional diets include salmon and other fish, seafood, mushrooms, berries, roots and tubers, and meats such as deer, duck, and rabbit. In contrast to the Easterners, the Northwestern peoples are traditionally hunter-gatherers, primarily. The generally mild climate led to the development of an economy based on year-round abundant food supplies, rather than having to rely upon seasonal agriculture. Yet, Native American tribes of California still relied on storing food for winter seasons, which included "nuts, seeds, and dried meat and fish". Since animals migrated, vegetation is seasonal, and also weather needs to be taken into account. In what is now California,
acorns can be ground into a flour that has at times served as the principal foodstuff for about 75 percent of the population, and dried meats can be prepared during the dry season. It seems that acorns and other nuts took priority among indigenous tribes because of the archaeological evidence of "mortars and pestles". Grinding acorns requires a lot of resources and time to gather and process them, which implies an area where location is more permanent. Gathering acorns took everyone in the tribe, because within weeks, the acorns would mature. Obtaining food was done communally. Acorns were ground to make soups and bread. The presence of rodent bones in Quiroste archaeological sites suggests that the Quiroste people ate rodents. Deer and seal bones are also found in indigenous communities. This caused some indigenous tribes to become dependent on missionaries for survival. Archaeological evidence shows that some indigenous tribes were eating cattle because of the reliance they had on missionaries. Although some tribes relied on the food from missionaries, they still hunted for their own food from the evidence of birds found that know to migrate to the area seasonally.
Southwestern Indigenous cuisine Ancestral Puebloans of the present-day Four Corners region of the United States, comprising
Arizona,
Colorado,
New Mexico, and
Utah, initially practiced subsistence agriculture by cultivating
maize,
beans,
squash,
sunflower seeds, and
pine nuts from the
pinyon pine, and game meat including
venison and
cuniculture, and freshwater fish such as
Rio Grande cutthroat trout and
rainbow trout are also traditional foods in the region. Ancestral Puebloans are also known for their basketry and pottery, indicating both an agricultural surplus that needed to be carried and stored, and clay pot cooking. Grinding stones have been used to grind maize into meal for cooking. Archaeological digs indicate a very early domestication of
turkeys for food.
New Mexican cuisine is heavily rooted in both
Pueblo and
Hispano food traditions, and is a prevalent cuisine in the American Southwest, especially in
New Mexico. The 2002
Foods of the Southwest Indian Nations won a
James Beard Award, the first Native American cookbook so honored. Publishers had told the author,
Lois Ellen Frank, that there was no such thing as Native American cuisine.
Alaska Native cuisine Alaska Native cuisine consists of nutrient-dense foods such as seal, fish (salmon), and moose. Along with these, berries (huckleberries) and bird eggs are traditionally consumed by Alaska Natives. Seal, walruses, and polar bears are the large game that Alaska Natives hunt. Smaller game includes whitefish,
Arctic char,
Arctic hare, and ptarmigan. Due to weather, edible plants like berries are only available to be consumed in the summer, so people have a diet very high in fat and protein, but low in carbohydrates. The game that is hunted is also used for clothing. The intestines of large mammals are used to make waterproof clothing and caribou fur is used to make warm clothing.
Dishes filets •
Acorn bread • Acorn crepe •
Acorn mush, from the
Miwok people •
Akutaq, also called "Eskimo ice cream", made from caribou or moose tallow and meat, berries, seal oil, and sometimes fish, whipped together with snow or water •
Bannock, is a type of
frybread that is eaten equally in the Arctic, Plains, Sub-Arctic, and Pacific cultural areas • Bean bread, made with corn meal and beans, popular among the
Cherokee • Bird brain stew, from the
Cree nation •
Black drink or
asi, a Southeastern ceremonial drink made from the
yaupon holly • Buffalo stew, from the Lakota and Cherokee people, also called
tanka-me-a-lo •
Cornbread and
corn pone—the word
pone derives from the word for 'bread' in some
Eastern Algonquian languages, such as
Powhatan apon and
Lenape ahpòn •
Dried meats like
jerky and smoked
salmon strips •
Filé powder, made from sassafras leaves, used by the
Choctaw for flavoring and thickening soups and stews as well as for herbal medicine •
Frybread, a dish made from ingredients distributed to Native Americans living on
reservations •
Green chili stew •
Hopi tea, an
herbal tea made from
Thelesperma megapotamicum • ''Lu'sknikn'', the
Mi'kmaq form of Bannock. • Mutton stew, from the Navajo people •
Nokake,
Algonquian hoecakes, made of cornmeal •
Nut milk, from the
Wabanaki •
Piki bread, from the
Hopi people •
Psindamoakan, a
Lenape hunter's food made of parched cornmeal mixed with maple sugar • Pueblo bread •
Salted salmon, an Inuit dish of brined
salmon in a heavy concentration of salt water, left for months to soak up salts •
Sapan (),
cornmeal mush, a staple of Lenape cuisine • Stink fish, an Inuit dish of dried fish, kept underground until ripe, for later consumption; also done with fish heads •
Succotash, a dish of beans and corn • Sumac lemonade, a Native American beverage made from
sumac berries •
Tiswin, a term used for several
fermented beverages in the Southwest, including a corn or fruit beer of the
Apache and a
saguaro fruit beer of the
Tohono O'odham • Walrus flipper soup, an Inuit dish made from
walrus flippers •
Wojapi, a
Plains Indian pudding of mashed, cooked berries
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Cafe Ohlone (Berkeley, CA) File:Matsunaga-2017-red-ink-bison-6820 (27121055349).jpg|Café Gozhóó (Whiteriver, Navajo County, AZ) == Indigenous cuisine of the Circum-Caribbean==