12 Strange Foods Our Ancestors Ate On The Frontier For Survival That We May Be Eating Again Soon

We consume a far greater diversity of foods from different cultures today than our ancestors did. And while that's a no-brainer with the evolution of our food system, preservation technology, and lifestyles, all of that could easily disappear in an instant, catapulting us backwards a hundred years and putting things on our plates like grass soup or turtles.

Yep, you heard me. Grass and turtles.

Strange foodsPhoto byRichelleg

Throughout history, people have consumed a wide variety of meals depending on what was available. For example, people who live in the Arctic Circle regularly eat seals, whereas the rest of us generally don't.

Also, ideas on what constitutes appropriate eating have evolved along with our notion of ourselves as more "civilized" (at least in our own perceptions). While the ordinary housewife today would be horrified at the thought of having to butcher and slaughter a chicken, duck, goose, or turkey, most women in the 1800s would have thought nothing of it.

Food, real nourishing food from yesteryear, would have sent most people today running. However, a lot of the wholesome and nourishing foods that our ancestors consumed gave them the energy they needed to live and to survive. And if things keep going like they are now, you may find yourself eating to live instead of living to eat.

Let's take a look at what's on the menu:

Bottoms up!Photo byRichelleg

Rodents

Rodents of every kind, from mice to rabbits, have all been consumed at some point. Although they don't have as much meat as larger animals, rodents are easy to add to the menu because they are plentiful and breed quickly. In fact, if you have the space for a rabbit hutch or two, consider getting a few meat rabbits. The steady supply of protein for the family will come in handy if the Deli goes down.

People also used to eat baby mice dipped in honey so they could swallow them whole. No thank you!

Beaver Tail

Beaver tails were one of the more peculiar-sounding delicacies found on the frontier. Beaver were, and still are, hunted for their warm pelts. Also, for vanilla extract flavoring.

Similar to how camels store energy in their humps and bears prepare for hibernation, beavers store energy in the form of fat in their tails. Nowadays, dietitians generally discourage saturated fats, but back then, fat was one of the harder nutrients to obtain on the frontier and the only thing keeping most people alive. Most wild game has very little fat. People could eat a whole moose or a mess of rabbits and, without fat, would still eventually starve due to their bodies not being able to produce energy and proteins.

Beaver tailPhoto byRichelleg

After the leathery skin was removed, beaver tails were cooked over a fire. This yields a product that resembles pork rinds.

Salted Pork

Bacon and salt pork are kind of the same; however, salt pork has a lot less actual meat. Soldiers would cut their own pieces of salt pork and fry them; a mainstay of Army rations.

Though it was undercooked by modern standards and sandwiched between two biscuit halves, it did supply the essential fat for soldiers to obtain the calories they required. The meat was preserved with salt, which killed any germs and other parasites.

Meats and Curing

The origins of cured meats may be traced back to the European Middle Ages, when they were developed as a technique to preserve meat and turn harsher, less appetizing cuts of animal into something edible. These meats are kind of where our "deli meats" come from today.

Back then, it was basically random meats ground with fats and pressed into logs to hang. Spices, particularly salt and nitrates, are added for preservation purposes.

Straight Lard

The primary "cooking oil" in the past was lard, which was made from animal fat. While it can get rancid, properly prepared lard doesn't grow mold. This led to the prevalent practice of rendering fat on the frontier. Even in modern times, lard can easily replace butter, cooking oil, and shortening.

Beef and then pork fat are the most common sources of rendered lard, with the fat that coats and shields organs, such as the kidneys, and the back fat the best to save.

Squirrel

Squirrel was probably one of the most popular meat sources for settlers in those early days. Even though there isn't much flesh on a single squirrel, squirrels are easy to hunt around the farm or when traveling because they are plentiful. Either the flesh can be removed from the carcass and cooked, or the squirrel can be cleaned, skinned, and roasted. Squirrel, along with the next few, are absolutely still popular today.

Fried squirrelPhoto byRichelleg

Turtle

Typically used in soups, but they could actually also be cooked right in their shell.

Squash, Not Just Summer Or Pumpkin

Squash isn't nearly as popular as it was in the era of the pioneers. Squash comes in a wide variety of varieties, including pumpkin, acorn, spaghetti, butternut, honeynut, and buffalo gourd. Growing squash was very common back then since it was a high-calorie food that kept well in a root cellar.

Squash of some kind was the main course of many meals, usually in the form of soup. They put whatever meat they had—a squirrel, for example—and called it dinner. Usually for a few nights, if they were lucky.

Organs

Instead of letting the meat go to waste, brains, hearts, livers, and other organs used to be consumed without anyone turning up their nose.

Alligator

Speaking of reptiles, those who made their home in the swamps soon realized how valuable alligators were as food. Despite being somewhat difficult to kill, an alligator had a lot of meat to offer.

AlligatorPhoto byRichelleg

Alligators have a lot of fat on them. A gator that is eight feet long may produce roughly forty pounds of life-saving protein.

Chicory

When and where coffee was scarce, people would either stretch their supply of coffee by combining it with chicory root or they would substitute coffee altogether. To make coffee, the root would be ground, roasted, and minced before being either steeped alone or combined with coffee grinds.

Dried Corn Soup

Because of its high yield per acre and ease of processing to separate the edible kernels from the remainder of the plant, corn was one of the best crops to produce on the frontier. Corn can be used as a grain after being dried or cooked.

Pioneer recipes include the obvious, cornbread, which is still consumed today. They would rehydrate the sun dried corn before adding it to the stock pot. This would make a flavorful soup that could be enhanced with greens, peppers, potatoes, eggs, and meat, depending on what was available.

I hope you enjoyed my article today! So tell me: what's for dinner tonight?

Dried cornPhoto byRichelleg

Attributions:

Gardiner, B. (2024a, February 27). Wild Edible Foods And Ancestral Eating - The Outdoor Apothecary. The Outdoor Apothecary. https://www.outdoorapothecary.com/ancestral-eating/

https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/75025/j.1753-4887.1989.tb02765.x.pdf;sequence=1