Food

Christmas Boar’s Head, to Goose, to Turkey

The changing Christmas entrée and how Charles Dickens helped standardize the turkey.

Boar’s Head

Before a goose at Christmas, and long before turkey, boar was the star of the English Christmas feast. At the table of the rich in Medieval England a cooked boar’s head was the main attraction. It was so special that it had its own Christmas carol (the Boar’s Head Carol) which would be sung as it was paraded into the hall.

While recipes varied, any way you cooked it the boar’s head was labor intensive. The head would be removed from the body, the skin would be carefully separated from the skull, cured meats and other ingredients would be stuff into the skin, it would be sewn back together, the whole head would be covered in muslin cloth, boiled, garnished, then dressed up with an apple in its mouth and perhaps some black ash to simulate fur.

boar's head Christmas dinners — The amount of labor involved in preparing the boar’s head meant only the wealthiest could afford it.

An added bonus at the table was roasted “gilded peacock”. Since the wow factor of a peacock is its showy feathers, the peacock’s head & skin was removed, the body was roasted, then the bird was put back together to be both edible and a showpiece. Also like the boar’s head it was only found on the tables of the wealthiest elite. That said it was mostly for show since apparently it didn’t taste particularly good.

As for the common people, depending on their finances they might have salted pork of some kind but a reliable alternative was pottage. Pottage was anything cooked in a pot. Special Christmas recipes might add certain spices as a seasonal treat. The most unfortunate of society could expect some of the feast leftovers, trenchers, and other scraps given as donations at the gates of clergy and the upper class. That said after waves of bubonic plague in the mid 14th century, which killed more people than animals, there was more meat available in general for all levels of society.

Goose

The goose became the Christmas entrée of choice in the 16th century when (supposedly) Queen Elizabeth I ordered others to eat roast goose for Christmas because that’s what she was eating when she heard the news of the English victory over the Spanish Armada in 1588.

As a main dish goose was a smart choice since it was something almost everyone could enjoy. Geese can be farmed (unlike wild boar), they don’t lay as many eggs as chickens so there is less reason to keep them around, they don’t provide milk like cows, they are larger than chickens so they can feed more people, and they take up less room than pigs. Geese also make exceptional guard animals (during the time you are raising them … before you cook them).

In the 19th century Queen Victoria ate the traditional boar’s head for Christmas dinner but for most people goose was the standard. A goose was relatively affordable but not cheap. Goose Clubs were layaway programs, frequently run by one’s local pub, where less affluent participants could make installment payments over time in order to have a goose for Christmas. The 1892 Sherlock Holmes story The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle is set at Christmas time and a goose club is a pivotal plot point.

Cooking a goose could be challenging depending on the kitchen. Too close to the fire a goose burns on the outside while being uncooked on the inside. The fat from the bird can drip into the fire causing bursts of flames. Also the size of the bird was difficult to accommodate if other things were being cooked. All of which led many Victorian Londoners to take their geese to their local bakeries who had seasonal side businesses of cooking people’s geese for them in their large bakery ovens (something Scrooge sees when he is traveling with the Ghost of Christmas Present in A Christmas Carol).

Turkey

Turkey comes from North America and some of the first turkeys to reach England were supposedly imported by William Strickland in 1526. He later had the turkey as part of his family crest. Initially turkeys were only for the wealthy since there were so few birds available. They were a status symbol and an exotic delicacy like how peacock had been, but unlike peacock a turkey tasted good.

By the Victorian era turkey was still a luxury but was no longer solely for the ultra rich. It was becoming more accessible to more people. Charles Dickens was a fan of turkey, so much so that the Cratchit family are gifted a prize winning turkey at the end of 1843’s A Christmas Carol.

The success of A Christmas Carol was so great that it not only reinvigorated the celebration of Christmas but it also popularized the idea of having a turkey for Christmas dinner instead of a goose. By the early 20th century advancements in farming both brought the price of turkeys down, and fattened the birds up, so as to make them Christmas feasts for everyone.

Humbug

Humbug the fraud, the hoax, the mint candy.

A humbug is another name for a hoax, a trick, a fraud, something that presents as one thing but is really something else. It was a mid 18th century English slang word that today is perhaps most closely associated with the character of Ebenezer Scrooge in Charles Dickens’s 1843 A Christmas Carol (the most famous Christmas ghost story of all time).

humbug is associated with Ebeneezer Scrooge

When Scrooge barks “Bah! Humbug!” he’s commenting on how Christmas is duplicitous, that he feels Christmas tells people they should be happy when they may have nothing to be happy about. To Scrooge, Christmas presents a face of cheer when beneath the surface the world is still as corrupt and as problematic as before. Scrooge the misanthrope, Scrooge the cantankerous grump. His “Bah! Humbug” establishes a baseline of Scrooge’s dislike of the season, his dim view of humanity, and how much work the three spirits will have to do to redeem him.

Humbug was a popular term for hoaxes and charlatans — While today we think of the word “humbug” mostly with *A Christmas Carol*, it used to be a popular word for charlatans, fraudsters, and hoaxes.

P.T. Barnum, the Prince of Humbug

One man who knew a thing or two about fraud was P.T. Barnum. Nicknamed the Prince of Humbugs, Barnum drew a fine line between what was and wasn’t an acceptable deception. He felt humbugs were acceptable tricks, that it was fine to trick the audience as long as they received something fun in return. One example of this was the Fiji Mermaid which he advertised as a beautiful woman rather than the monstrous animal hybrid he had on display (which was fake either way). If the ends justified the means it was all ok in Barnum’s opinion.

Barnum’s 1865 book The Humbugs of the World documents historic deceptions and the universality of hoaxes. For Barnum his style of humbug tricks were acceptable (not surprisingly) but hoaxes that tricked people out of their money with nothing in return were wrong. He spoke out publicly against psychics and other frauds who tricked and hurt people.

humbug candy — Humbug the striped candies have been popular since the 19th century, but unfortunately were the source of a poisoning scandal in 1858.

Mint Candy

Something that’s not a trick, but is a treat, are humbug candies. Humbugs are striped candies, typically mint flavored, most commonly found in English speaking countries (except the US). While they are probably English in origin, and have existed since at least the 1820s, it’s unknown exactly who invented them or why they are called humbugs.

In the mid 19th century humbugs gained an unwanted spotlight. On October 30, 1858 a batch of humbugs in Bradford, England were accidentally made with arsenic trioxide instead of daft (a filler agent made with powdered limestone & plaster of Paris, used as a sugar replacement to cut cost). A junior druggist scooped the wrong powder and gave it to the assistant candy maker who didn’t notice. This mistake killed 20 people (13 of whom were children) and poisoned an additional 200 people. One positive is this led to the Pharmacy Act of 1868 which, among other things, required poisonous substances to be specially marked to avoid confusion.

A look back at how humbugs were made in 1967.

Tofurkey

The vegan turkey option that’s a part of the long history of meat substitutes.

Tofurkey is a plant-based meat replacement loaf. It’s typically soy and/or wheat based with a stuffing core seasoned with herbs & spices. Its name is a portmanteau of “tofu” and “turkey” and was designed as a turkey substitute for Thanksgiving. When spelled “Tofurky” with no “E” it’s the brand name version created by Seth Tibbot.

Turtle Island Foods is a vegetarian food company started by Tibbot in 1980 in Forest Grove, Oregon. By 1995 Tibbot (who had been living in a 3 story treehouse of his own making) teamed up with vegetarian caterers Hans & Rhonda Wrobel to create a vegan alternative to the Thanksgiving turkey, and the tofurky was born. That first Thanksgiving they produced 500 tofurkys but by 2023 an estimated 5 million had been sold.

meat replacement ideas over the years — Meat replacement options have been around for thousands of years.

Substitute

The tofurkey is a part of the long history of meat replacement foods. Tofu (made from soy beans) has been eaten in China for at least 2,000 years. As Buddhism spread around Asia, preaching non-violence, it gradually converted more and more people to meat substitutes as killing animals and eating meat was strongly discouraged (that said it is unlikely the Buddha was a strict vegetarian). Wheat gluten based food (seitan, “wheat meat”, etc) was also invented in China, around the 6th century CE.

Seventh-day Adventist (a religion started in 1863 from the failed Second Coming predictions of William Miller) encourages a healthy vegetarian diet. Headquartered in Battle Creek, Michigan they opened their Sanitarium in 1903 which was a “premier wellness destination” and became famous under the direction of Dr. John Harvey Kellogg. A strong proponent of vegetarianism, Kellogg (who created the Kellogg Company with his brother William Kellogg in 1906) promoted around 100 food items aimed at living a healthy meat-free lifestyle. Kellogg’s Corn Flakes still exist today but one of his other big hits was Protose, a very successful fake meat that (at least texturally) resembled veal or chicken.

While vegetarianism has waxed & waned over the years the world is currently in a boom of plant-based meat replacement options. Beyond Burgers, Gardenburgers, Impossible Foods, MorningStar Farms, No Evil Foods, Quorn, and scores of others have all given people meat alternatives, and the tofurkey is a seasonal part of it all.

Seth Tibbot talks about inventing the tofurky.

Monster Cereals

The seasonal cereal Halloween treat.

Autumn brings seasonal foods – pumpkin spice lattes, pumpkin beer, apple cider, and monster cereals. Created in 1971 by General Mills, monster cereals are a line of sugary cereals with cartoon mascots based on classic Universal Monsters.

Cereal mascots as we know them began in 1933 with the Rice Krispies characters of Snap, Crackle and Pop. After WWII with televised commercials cereal mascots became animated, increasing the competition for attention & dollars. In the late 1960s General Mills had new flavoring ideas and was in search of a marketing strategy that would appeal to kids. They had a chocolate and a strawberry flavoring that, when added to milk, would flavor the milk like chocolate or strawberry. What they needed were mascots to sell the cereal.

Laura Levine of the ad agency Dancer Fitzgerald Sample, who had been hired to help sell these new cereals, was the person who had the inspired idea of using monsters. Introduced in 1971 Count Chocula and Franken Berry were the first monster cereal creations, based on the classic horror monsters of Dracula and Frankenstein (or “Frankenstein’s monster” if we’re being pedantic). In 1973 the ghost Boo Berry (whose animated voice was loosely modeled off of actor Peter Lorre) was added to the lineup, selling a blueberry flavored cereal.

monster cereal collage — Various monsters have been a part of monster cereals over the years.

Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry have been the reliable trio of monster cereal flavors since the 1970s but other flavors have been tried. Frute Brute and Fruity Yummy Mummy were both been launched, discontinued, relaunched, and discontinued again over the years with their flavoring reconfigured at different times. In 2021 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of monster cereals General Mills began selling “Monster Mash” boxes, which are a mix of the monster cereal flavors. In 2023 the zombie themed, caramel apple flavored, Carmella Creeper was released as the latest new monster cereal. Finally, monster cereals used to be available year round but in 2010 they became a seasonal product, rising from the darkness every autumn Halloween season (but you can search for them all year round).

Frankenstool

One curious side effect of the Franken Berry strawberry flavoring was realized in 1972 when a 12 year old boy was admitted to the hospital with pink / red poop. Documented by the University of Maryland Medical School the condition of “Franken Berry stool” was publicized in the paper “Benign red pigmentation of stool resulting from food coloring in a new breakfast cereal (the Franken Berry stool).” Later it was discovered that Boo Berry would change poop green.

The formulation of both cereals was eventually changed to avoid this.

A deep dive into Monster Cereals.

Pink Doughnut Boxes

Pink doughnut boxes exist because of Cambodian immigrants.

In movies and TV shows doughnut boxes are frequently pink. This is in part because many of the doughnut boxes in the Los Angeles area are pink. These pink boxes are a subtle hint that, if you spot them in a story set in New York City or somewhere, it was actually shot in LA. The reason these doughnut boxes are pink is because of Cambodian immigrant Ted Ngoy and his doughnut shop empire.

In 1975 Ngoy and his family fled the Khmer Rouge on the last flight out of Phenom Penh and emigrated to America. He started life over as a janitor in a Lutheran Church but eventually noticed how popular the doughnut shop was near his other job as a gas station attendant. Ngoy enrolled in Winchell’s training program learning the ins & outs of running a doughnut shop.

Taking what he learned Ngoy started his own doughnut shop, Christy’s Donuts, in the La Habra area in 1977. Eventually this sole shop begat others and Ted & his wife owned over 50 locations in southern California. Along the way he would sponsor other Cambodian immigrants, setting them up for business in his doughnut shops. But it was during the scrappy early days that he came upon the idea for pink boxes.

the character of Marsellus Wallace crossing the street in Pulp Fiction carrying a box of doughnuts — The *Pulp Fiction* character of Marsellus Wallace carries a pink box of doughnuts across the street just before his day gets much much worse.

Pretty in Pink

Supposedly Ngoy wanted red boxes as red is the color of luck for Chinese-Cambodians. White on the other hand is the color of mourning & death. The closest his box vendor Westco had were leftover pink boxes which sold for a few cents cheaper than white boxes. For the price and the symbolism(ish) pink became the color of boxes for Ngoy’s shops.

Soon Ngoy’s competitors were using pink boxes as well. In 2003 these boxes inspired Kenneth “Cat Daddy” Pogson for the box design of his new company Voodoo Doughnut in Portland, Oregon who have some of the most famous pink doughnut boxes around.

Today you still see pink doughnut boxes around LA. They’re so connected to southeast Asian immigrants that they became a canvas for Cambodian American artists in 2022. As of 2020 it’s estimated around 80% of the independent doughnut shops in California are owned by Cambodian-Americans, many of whom credit “Uncle Ted” for getting them started.

Added info: similar to how Ted Ngoy’s influence helped Cambodian immigrants dominate the LA doughnut scene, Tippi Hedren is credited with helping Vietnamese immigrants dominate the nail salon industry.

Also, the highs & lows of Ted Ngoy’s life story are enough to fill multiple lifetimes. You can learn more about him in the 2020 documentary The Donut King.

The wild ride of the highs & lows of Ted Ngoy’s life as The Donut King.

Sunday Morning reports on the Cambodian history of California doughnut shops.

Breakfast, Lunch, & Dinner (Supper, & Tea)

The names and details of our daily meals are relatively recent creations.

Breakfast

The clue being in the name, breakfast is the first meal of the day, the meal where you “break your fast” (the fast of not eating overnight in your sleep). That said this first meal of the day wasn’t always first thing in the morning like it is today. Up through the early Middle Ages people would rise and do without eating until after they had worked for several hours.

Further complicating things this late morning first meal of the day, before being called breakfast, was called dinner. From the Old French “disner” meaning “to break one’s fast” the first meal of the day only became “breakfast” in the 15th century. This early meal would be bread, maybe some cheese, and some alcohol (alcohol being safer to drink than water).

Dinner and Supper

As breakfast became breakfast, dinner moved from the 1st time slot to the 2nd. You would eat a small meal upon waking (breakfast), eat a large meal in the late morning to give you energy for the rest of your work (dinner), and then a small meal in the evening. The small meal at the end of the day was supper, from the French “souper”. This was typically a soup that you supped, a soup that was slow cooked throughout the day to be ready in the evening.

But dinner wasn’t done moving and moved again from the 2nd time slot to the 3rd, replacing supper as the last meal of the day. This change wasn’t all at once. The dinner shift in time slot was due to several reasons not least of which was the changing nature of how people worked. When people worked out of their homes or in an agrarian lifestyle in the fields near their homes, it was easier to prepare & eat a large meal in the middle of the day. Through the Industrial Revolution work moved to factories & offices and it became impractical to have a large meal in the middle of the day. As such dinner continued to be the biggest meal of the day but it moved to the end of the day when people returned from work.

That said, while “dinner” is the term most people use for the big meal at the end of the day some people (particularly those of agricultural backgrounds) still call this meal supper. Generally speaking though “dinner” and “supper” are seen as synonymous terms for the same meal. As such the Last Supper could have been the Last Dinner.

Lunch

With breakfast at the start of the day, and dinner now the last meal of the day, this left a time slot opening in the middle of the day. Lunch is essentially if dinner and supper switched places and supper changed its name. Starting in the 18th century lunch became a small midday meal, increasing in popularity as more and more people had their dinner at the end of the day.

Tea Time

So what is tea / tea time? After the Portuguese Catherine of Braganza introduced tea to England in the 17th century it eventually became a staple of British life. Tea as a meal took two forms: Afternoon Tea and High Tea. Confusingly, afternoon tea is the classier of the two.

Tea was originally had after the large midday meal of dinner, as tea was believed to assist digestion. As dinner moved to the end of the day tea time was created as a way to hold people over between lunch and dinner while still having tea after midday. Afternoon tea, as the name suggests, was served in the afternoon. It was a light meal of tea served with cucumber sandwiches, scones, cakes and other elegant snack foods – it’s tea time of the upper class (because who else had the time to break for fancy foods in the midafternoon?). High tea on the other hand was the meal of the working class. Working people couldn’t take a break midafternoon so they had their tea with heartier snacks after they came home in the evening but before their supper (or dinner).

As dinner replaced supper as the final meal of the day some people in British countries merged dinner and high tea, calling this meal “tea”.

Brain Freeze

The short headache triggered by cold food and/or drinks touching the inside of your mouth.

To start, brain freeze (aka “ice cream headache” or “cold-stimulus headache”) only affects about 30-50% of the population. Most people can eat ice cream and drink extra cold drinks without any fear of reprisal from their nervous system.

Brain freeze occurs when the roof of your mouth or the back of your throat suddenly come into contact with cold food, cold drinks, or even cold air. The trigeminal nerve in your head reacts to the cold by telling the arteries connected to the meninges (the membranes surrounding your brain) to contract to conserve warmth (much like how our bodies react to the cold in general). Then the body sends more warm blood up to the head telling those same arteries to expand. This quick succession of vasoconstriction and vasodilation of blood vessels triggers pain receptors along the trigeminal nerve which creates the pain you feel behind the eyes or forehead during a brain freeze.

A lot of nerve

While we all have a trigeminal nerve its varying sensitivity may explain why not everyone gets brain freeze. For example 37% of Americans may get brain freeze but only around 15% of Danish adults do. Further, 93% of people who get migraines are also susceptible to brain freeze.

the Myth of 8 Glasses of Water

You don’t need to drink 8 glasses of water a day.

In short: you only need to drink water when you’re thirsty. For millions of years humans and our human ancestors survived using thirst as an indicator that it’s time for more water. It wasn’t until the 20th century that the idea of drinking 8 glasses of water a day began.

We all need water to live but liquid water isn’t our only source. Coffee, tea, juice, soft drinks, fruits, vegetables, etc. all contain water. Depending on your diet you can get around 20% of the water you need just from food. Then because coffee, milk, juice, tea, etc. are mostly water, you’re probably already getting all the water you need each day without having to drink 8 more glasses of it.

… But Maybe You Do Need More Water

Daily water consumption is about maintaining balance: you need to replace the water you lose. If you live in a hot climate, or you’re sweating from exercise, you lose water faster than someone sitting still in a temperate climate. As such you need to replace water faster than normal which means drinking more water.

Also, should you be lost on a hike somewhere, you should ration sweat not water. Try to limit your physical exertion and sweat less but drink when you need to. A common mistake is that you should ration your water which, while it’s true you don’t want to waste a limited resource, if you’re thirsty you should drink. Your water isn’t doing you any good sitting inside a bottle.

Water water everywhere

On the flip side it’s possible to drink too much water. Exercise-associated hyponatremia is where you’re engaged in an endurance activity such as running a marathon, you sweat out water and sodium, but then you only drink water. In drinking regular water you manage to replenish your lost water but not your sodium. The result is low blood-sodium levels. This imbalance can cause poor nerve communication which leads to poor muscle control, poor performance, etc. Athletes with hyponatremia can feel nauseous, develop muscle cramps, and become confused leading some to think they’re dehydrated and drink even more water (making the situation worse).

Hyponatremia is becoming more prevalent in sports as an increasing number of novice athletes participate in long-distance endurance activities. For example in the 2002 Boston Marathon 13% of runners were found to have hyponatremia from drinking too much water. Athletes need to replenish their sodium levels along with their water. Part of the solution (pardon the pun) is to drink sports beverages that contain electrolytes (which are salts and can replenish sodium levels). This is why sports drinks boast about having electrolytes.

So, if you’re thirsty, drink some water and if you’re engaged in an endurance sport remember to get some electrolytes along with your water.

Added info: to bust another myth, consuming caffeinated beverages won’t dehydrate you. While excessive caffeine has a number of downsides, drinking coffee or tea is an acceptable a way to hydrate.

Adam Ruins Everything dives into the myth of 8 glasses of water a day.

Mistakes Happen (Sometimes Intentionally)

Nothing is perfect and we should embrace mistakes and imperfections.

Mistaken Mistakes

Persian carpets (aka Iranian carpets) come in a diversity of designs and sizes, but they frequently contain repeating symmetrical patterns. One alleged feature in handmade Persian carpets is a mistake in the design pattern (not in the construction) included intentionally. This “Persian flaw” serves as a reminder that only Allah is perfect. The flaw would be something small only noticed by the keenest of observers. It’s also been said that the Amish have a similar practice, that they include an intentional flaw (a “humility block”) in their quilts as a reminder that only God is perfect … but it isn’t true.

Lancaster curator Wendell Zercher has quoted Amish quilt makers as saying “… no one has to remind us that we’re not perfect.” As for Persian flaws, most accounts of this idea come from Western sources and is probably an example of orientalism. While both of these are nice stories that probably help to sell imperfect rugs & quilts, we have little to no evidence to support them. If anything, to intentionally make just one mistake out of humility would prove the opposite, bragging that you have the ability to make a perfect creation (but choose not to).

Actual “Mistakes”

There are however some cultures that really do include intentional imperfections in their work. Women in the Punjab region between India & Pakistan create Phulkari shawls of intricate designs. In these designs they sometimes include “mistakes” which are momentary changes in the overall design pattern. These changes are included to mark important events during the creation of the shawl (births, weddings, deaths, etc). Sometimes the symmetrical pattern is disrupted as spiritual protection from the evil eye.

On the left is a phulkari shawl with intentional changes to the pattern. To the right is a Navajo weaving featuring a “spirit line”.

Some Navajo also include imperfections in their weavings for spiritual reasons. The ch’ihónít’i (aka the “spirit line” or the “weaver’s path”) is a single line leading out of the middle of a design to the edge of the weaving. The spirit line is thought to give the weaver’s soul a way to exit the weaving so as to not get trapped in the design.

Embrace Imperfections

Of course if you accept that nothing is perfect then you have no need to add imperfections because everything is imperfect. The Japanese concept of wabi-sabi is the Zen view that everything is imperfect, impermanent, vulnerable. Unlike Western design ideas which frequently strive for idealized perfection, wabi-sabi celebrates the imperfections that make everything (and everyone) unique.

Kintsugi repaired ceramics, using gold & lacquer to feature (rather than hide) the imperfections.

Building off of wabi-sabi, kintsugi is the practice of repairing broken pottery with bits of valuable metals & lacquer that, rather than trying to seamlessly hide the repaired cracks, highlights them. Kintsugi honors the history of the object and celebrates its imperfections. Nothing lasts forever and we should recognize the beauty of imperfect vessels.

A crash course on the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi.

Ugly Fruits & Vegetables

In the West this embrace of the imperfect has recently manifested itself in ugly fruits & vegetables. Imperfect looking produce has traditionally gone unsold and makes up 40% of total food waste. Producers throw away food because they don’t think retailers will want it (it doesn’t meet “quality standards”) and then retail stores throw away the unsold odd looking food that customers won’t buy. This is all despite the fact that the taste and nutritional content of this “ugly” food may be identical to “normal” looking produce.

The European Union declared 2014 the European Year Against Food Waste. The French supermarket chain Intermarché began their “Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables” marketing campaign that celebrated ugly looking produce, they gave the foods their own section in the store, and sold them at a discount. It proved so successful that other stores & delivery services, such as Imperfect Foods, started to do likewise as consumers began to accept the wabi-wabi nature of produce.

The Intermarché marketing campaign to help reduce food waste was a huge success.

the First Thanksgiving Menu

Lacking key ingredients, the menu at the first Thanksgiving of 1621 was a bit different than the traditional turkey dinner of today.

In the fall of 1621 the English Pilgrims and the Wampanoag came together in Massachusetts for, what has subsequently become a much mythologized, 3 day harvest festival. The pilgrims had a lot to be thankful for — that they were still alive following the deaths of half their fellow pilgrims the previous winter, that they had their supplies fortified by the Wampanoag, and that they had completed a successful summer growing season. What they ate as they gave thanks is debatable.

Definitely on the Menu

One food that was definitely served was venison. Massasoit, the leader of the Wampanoag, had 5 deer brought to the event. Another meat on the menu was “wild fowl”, but exactly what kind of birds these were is unknown. It’s possible that there was turkey at the first Thanksgiving but more likely it was goose or duck (or a combination). Other regional bird options at the time would have been swan and passenger pigeon.

Also definitely present was corn. The Wampanoag, who used the Three Sisters method of farming, had taught the pilgrims how to grow corn. As the pilgrims had grown a successful crop of Flint corn (aka “Indian corn”) it was cooked into a porridge, a bread, and/or with beans.

Maybe on the Menu

Given that the Plymouth Colony was by the water it’s very likely that seafood was also served. Eels, clams, muscles, cod, bass, and/or lobsters were very likely a part of the meal. It’s worth noting though that, unlike today, lobster was considered a food of last resort.

There were certainly vegetables & fruits on the menu but which ones were never specified (other than corn). Chestnuts, walnuts, beans, onions, carrots, cabbage, pumpkins, and various squashes were all grown in the area. Blueberries, plums, grapes, and raspberries were also grown in the area and could have been present. While cranberries might have been served cranberry sauce definitely was not since the colonists lacked the necessary sugar (and that cranberry sauce didn’t exist for another 50 years).

Not on the Menu

Even though pumpkins may have been present, pumpkin pie definitely was not. The pilgrims had neither the butter nor the flour necessary to make pumpkin pie – they didn’t even have an oven in 1621. Something pumpkin pie-esque that may have been prepared is a spiced pumpkin soup/custard cooked directly inside a pumpkin which was roasted on hot ashes.

There was no stuffing because, again, the colonists lacked the necessary flour. There were also no potatoes (mashed or otherwise). Potatoes came from South America and, while they had made their way to Europe by the late 16th century via the Spanish, they had yet to make their way to New England. There also weren’t any forks on the table since they too hadn’t made their way to North America yet (but on the upside nobody present had an overbite).

A historical reenactment of how to cook some of the foods present at the first Thanksgiving.