Iroquois Cooking
Roast Corn
Many recipes call for ground, roast corn. Dried Iroquois white flour corn works best and roasts nicely.
To roast corn, use a heavy frying pan. A cast iron one works best. You can add some oil to the pan but you don’t have to. Place corn in the frying pan about an inch thick. Heat to medium-low and slowly roast the kernels, stirring and turning often to keep it from burning. If the heat is too high, the corn kernels may explode or blacken. You don’t want this to happen. It takes a while to roast corn so count on about a half hour. Finished roast corn should be evenly golden brown and they should taste good. Try one and see!
To grind the corn, use a hand crank or mill or mortar and pestle. Blenders work but it causes a lot of wear and tear to the appliance! Coffee grinders work well for small amounts of corn. ENJOY!!
Roast Seed Snack
whole kernel corn
soy beans
pumpkin seeds
salt, garlic powder
Place a small amount of oil in a heavy frying pan. You need just enough to coat the bottom of the pan. If you like, garlic may be added to the oil. Heat to medium-high. Add corn kernels and stir constantly. After a few minutes, reduce heat to medium. Stir kernels until they are golden brown. Remove the pan from the heat.
(Remember that corn cooked to a very high temperature may explode!) Repeat this same procedure with the soy beans and the pumpkin seeds. Mix them all together, add salt if desired.
Three Sisters Soup
olive oil
2 onions, diced
2 leeks, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 quart tomatoes, chopped
2 green peppers, chopped
2 Cups pre-soaked corn kernels (Iroquois White Flour Corn)
4 carrots, sliced
4 potatoes, diced
2 cups green beans cut into 1″ pieces
2 summer squash, diced
3 Tblsp fresh basil, minced
3 Tblsp fresh parsley, minced
1 tsp minced hot pepper or 1/4 tsp dried cayenne pepper
In a large sauce pan, sauté the onions, leeks, and garlic over medium heat in oil until they begin to brown. Add tomatoes and peppers, and cook for a minute over high heat. Reduce heat to a simmer, and add carrots,potatoes, and corn kernels, also add water to desired thickness. Bring to a full boil, cover and turn heat downto medium-low. Simmer slowly for 2 hours. Add green beans, summer squash and spices during the last 20 minutes. Enjoy this soup with a fresh salad for a great meal!
Fry Bread
4 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
3 Tablespoons baking powder
milk or water to make proper consistency
oil for frying
Mix the dry ingredients together. Then add water or milk ( we usually use milk) to make a working consistency– sort of like the consistency of biscuit dough. Use some extra flour to help shape the dough into round or oval shapes about 4-5 inches across. Fry them in oil until done on one side; then flip them and fry the other side.
Corn Soup
Corn soup is a favorite among the Tuscarora people. The traditional soup is made with green corn that has been carefully
washed using wood ashes from hardwood trees mixed with boiling water. The corn is cooked and washed three times so that it is milky and has no black “eyes” floating around or stuck in the kernels.
To make the soup you put the washed corn into a large cooking pot and mix in kidney beans Add cold water to the desired
thickness. Add some cooked deer, moose or beaver meat. Some people use cow meat or salt pork or spare ribs in place of the wild game. You may want to put some salt and pepper in the soup now too. You cook all this until the corn is cooked. Let the soup simmer for half an hour to an hour. This is the real, old traditional corn soup.
To make the soup more of a vegetable soup you may add fresh carrots, turnips, and cabbage. You can also use pork or pork hocks. This is really more of a vegetable soup with a corn base.
Corn Bread
The traditional recipe calls for white corn put through the washing process only once rather than the three times required for the corn soup. The corn is then dried on a wire screen for the day or night or over a wood stove. In about 12 hours, the corn should be ready to pound with the corn pounder. It is best to do this when the corn is not entirely dry. When it is still a bit moist the kernels will not fly out of the pounder. If you use an electric appliance, the kernels should be completely dry.
You now put the corn flour into a bowl and add boiling water to it. Then add a drained can of kidney beans into the corn and mix it all together until all wet and you can form the corn mush into round, thick, flat loaves to be cooked in very hot water. The water must be boiling and then turned down so it is not bubbling. A bubbling boil will cause the loaves to fall apart. Put the loaves in the boiling water and cook until they float to the top of the water. When the corn bread loaves float,they are ready. To eat, you may put on melted butter which will be absorbed into the loaves. The corn bread loaves should be about 5-7 inches in diameter and about one to one and a half inches thick.
