The Thanksgiving Meal Part 2 by Leah Wilderrotter

Today we are going to be continuing on the journey of the Thanksgiving meal. Last week’s post we went over a brief history of Thanksgiving and how potatoes were used at the first Thanksgiving. This post will be about the vegetables and pumpkin pie.

Vegetables

One of the reasons why the pilgrims were celebrating Thanksgiving was because they had a successful growing season.  That means they definitely had vegetables on the table. Some potential vegetables the Pilgrims could have had at the feast include cabbage, carrots, squash, lettuce, and corn. The most common vegetable would have been corn. Pilgrims did not eat corn the way that we eat corn today. They would have taken the corn off the cobb and made it into a corn meal so they could use the corn meal for making other dishes.  Most of the vegetables that we consumed were roasted and not baked. Vegetables were also used to mix in with other dishes.

 

Pumpkin Pie

Pumpkins and squash are native to the New England area. When it comes to pumpkin pie at the first feast, they most likely did not have any. I know what you are thinking, how did they not have Thanksgiving without the pie or potatoes? I have no clue! The reason behind not having pumpkin pie is because the settlers lacked butter and flour to create the crust.  For all of the pumpkin pie lovers out there, there was a solution they came up with.  The Pilgrims would take a pumpkin and hollow it out, fill the shell with milk and other spices, and then put the gourd on the ash of the fire.

 

I am shocked with the information that we have learned about today. The most interesting information that I read was that they did not have flour to make baked goods with.  Flour is an ingredient that gets used a lot in today’s society. Next week will be the conclusion to the series and we will be discussing the best part of the Thanksgiving meal… the turkey.

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