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Indigenous American Cuisine: About

Indigenous American Cuisine

Link to Native Harvests by Barrie E Kavasch in Freading
Link to New Native Kitchen by Freddie Bitsoie on Freading
Link to tawâw : progressive Indigenous cuisine / Shane M. Chartrand with Jennifer Cockrall-King in the catalog
Link to Fry bread : a Native American family story by Kevin Noble Maillard ; illustrated by Juana Martinez-Neal in the catalog
Link to Not by Bread Alone by Vilhjamur Stefansson on Freading
Link to Everything you wanted to know about Indians but were afraid to ask by Anton Treuer in the catalog
Link to Historic Cookery by Fabiola Cabeza de Baca Gilbert on Freading
Link to Western Apache Heritage by Richard Perry on Freading

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Indigenous American Cuisine

Probably one of the most misunderstood and underrepresented cuisines in the United States today is Native American cuisine. It is the area’s oldest cuisine, one both rich in flavor and diverse in origin, that Native Americans developed long before contact with any Europeans.

Why it’s so underrepresented is a great question without an easy answer. Part of the problem is how the country’s history is told, which isn’t from a Native American perspective. But it’s also because many of the contributions that Native Americans have made to the foods eaten everyday around the U.S. are not acknowledged as part of the history taught in schools, so now most Americans don’t know that many of these foods were given to the world by Native Americans.

Native American cuisine includes indigenous and wild plant and animal ingredients, but it also includes cultivated plant ingredients found in various tribes throughout the Americas. The “Magic Eight” — corn, beans, squash, chiles, tomatoes, potatoes, vanilla, and cacao — are eight plants that Native people gave to the world and are now woven into almost every cuisine. 

Like many cuisines, Native American cuisine is not static. There are four distinct historical periods that comprise it: the Pre-Contact Period (dating back from approximately 10,000 BC to 1492 AD), the First Contact Period (from 1492 AD to the 1800s), the Government Issue Period (beginning in the middle- to late-1800s during the Native American relocation period), and the New Native American Cuisine Period (where we are now). Continue reading from OpenTable

Learn More About the History, Culture and Current Social Concerns of Native Peoples

Link to Celebrate Native American Culture Resource Guide
Link to Indigenous Medicine resource guide
Link to Native American Heritage Month resource guide
Link to Native American Arts & Crafts resource guide
Link to Indian Child Welfare Act resource guide
Link to Indigenous American Mythologies Resource Guide
Link to Local Indigenous Peoples resource guide
Link to The Trail of Tears Resource Guide
Link to Native American Music Resource Guide
Link to Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Resource Guide
Link to Indigenous American Cuisine Resource Guide
Link to The True Story of Pocahontas Resource Guide
Link to Navajo Code Talkers resource guide
Link to The Lost Children of the Residential School System Resource Guide
Link to The Pequot War Resource Guide
Link to Native American Activism Resource Guide
Link to The Wounded Knee Massacre Resource Guide
Link to Pipelines on Tribal Land Resource Guide

Link to Indigenous American Heritage Resource Guide Series Homepage