Food Flight!
By BRENDA HOLDER
I have been involved in many discussions regarding traditional foods of Aboriginal people and going back even further to our primitive ancestors (of all human beings). Often we think of the primary food source as being the big Woolly Mammoths from primitive times or more recently, Caribou and Moose, and other prey of that nature. I’ve been told that really we didn’t eat birds until farming came along. I’m not 100% certain if this is fact so I can’t substantiate it, but I understand why, given that it is more economical with a bow and arrow to hunt larger animals, where you will have a greater food cache. However, not all hunting involves moving to catch animals. Trapping for food was also a common way, where snares and other devices could catch rabbits, nets for fishing, and possibly even for birding. We don’t know how much primitive man would rely on birds as a food source, but I do know that my people have a long established relationship with eating birds like Canada Geese. It’s likely that our abilities for catching these birds came from primitive man’s finely honed skills.
Canada Goose is a delicacy that many hunters today enjoy on the table, a great food source that is highly nutritious. I know many people who have interesting recipes for their game birds, but a really cool way to “cook your goose” comes from my mom and grandmother. A goose would be suspended from a rope in the middle of a tent or tipi (I guess we just cooked them outside) and hung close to hot coals from a fire. The rope would be wound tightly and the bird would continually twist over the hot coals to cook, while the women would do their beading, moccasins, other food prep. Once in a while one would get up, flip the geese over and/or twist the rope again quite tightly.
Sometimes the bird would be cut out and almost filleted into a flat piece, and then cooked in a similar way in a basket with large open weave. It was also spun to be cooked. I recall a time when my mother brought home some wild fowl that had been smoked on a traditional smoking rack. It was absolutely delicious! I had many times eaten dried moose meat, smoked meat, smoked fish (begrudgingly), but that was my first time tasting smoked bird! These traditional methods of cooking really gets one’s imagination going in the hopes of some sort of experimental process to delve into and try. A Cree/Iroquois Métis, Brenda was born in Jasper National Park. Her company, Mahikan Trails (mahikan.ca) delivers unique programs through Aboriginal Tradition to explore the natural wonders of the Canadian Rockies.