Pioneer Meals ~ Julie Lence

 

Courtesy Modern Pioneer Mom

 ‘What’s for dinner?’ It’s the phrase everyone across the globe utters daily. Italians are mostly likely serving pasta. The night’s menu in Mexico might include tamales, while over in the Caribbean, folks could be frying fish. In the U.S., dinner ranges anywhere from fast food to chicken & dumplings, to steak & potatoes. At the end of this month, most Americans will sit down to a feast of turkey, ham, potatoes, gravy, and stuffing. With today’s modern stoves,  microwave ovens, gas grills, and deep fryers, preparing a large meal isn’t too difficult or time consuming. Back in the day, it was both. Pioneer women and chuck wagon cooks stood over the fire from sun-up to sun-down cooking the day’s meals. They kneaded dough and churned butter without the help of today’s appliances, and woke early the next morning to start all over again.

Ever wonder what those women and chuck wagon cooks were serving up?

With flour, sugar, corn meal, potatoes, beans, and fruits and vegetables such as pears, squash, corn, and pumpkin filling home larders, pioneer women served a breakfast of coffee, bread & butter, cold meat from the day before, and corn cakes. Lunch was the main meal and included dried pumpkin, beans & butter, turnips, fruit, and some sort of meat (deer, rabbit, turkey, pork, beef, buffalo, and chicken). Supper was a lighter fare of porridge or bread and milk. Molasses or sweetened water was used if milk wasn’t available.   

courtesy YouTube

Chuck wagon cooks dished up meals of beans, fresh beef, dried fruit, biscuits, bacon, potatoes, eggs, and salt pork to cowboys. Saloons served pork & beans with bacon, pickled eggs, and pretzels. And in those lunch pails children carried to school were cornbread and syrup sandwiches, bread with lard, or bread and bacon. To keep meat from spoiling, pioneers often had a smokehouse on their property where early November they would erect a low-burning fire and hang meats to cure. (This process took several weeks and once complete, the meat kept well into the following summer.) Vegetables were canned and fruits were dried.

Cooking and storing food to last throughout the year wasn’t easy. As much as I adore the wild west, I prefer cooking on my electric stove and gas grill and having a refrigerator to keep fruits and vegetables from spoiling.