Thanksgiving and food are almost synonymous. When we think of what we will do on this holiday, we probably think of the dinner we will consume. It has always been so. One traditional image of the Pilgrims is their surrounding a table laden with many kinds of food in a demeanor of gratitude.But, that isn't altogether an accurate account of the first Thanksgiving dinner, according to Lucille R. Penner who wrote "Eating the Plates: A Pilgrim Book of Food and Manners," (Simon & Schuster/Aladdin Paperbacks). "After they got off the Mayflower, food was harder to find than they had expected.. . . They had barely enough food to keep them alive."
After the first year of struggle (only four Pilgrim women were still alive) Gov. William Bradford declared a time of celebration at the harvest, which consisted mainly of Indian corn. Hunters brought in ducks, geese and turkeys to accompany the plums, berries, corn-flour bread and grape wine. The Indian chief Massasoit was invited but, says Penner, "they had not expected him to arrive with 90 braves!"
According to the author, the chief sent out his hunters, who returned with five deer that provided enough food for the large group.
This story and many other tidbits make "Eating the Plates" a delicious read for this time of year. For example, Indian pudding made with corn flour became a mainstay of the diet, and a heavy pot was kept "steaming and bubbling over the fire almost all the time."
Meat, which was a big part of the English diet, was hard to come by in the new land. The Pilgrims' muskets often scared away animals. Trapping was not readily learned. At first, the main supply of meat came from bargaining or trading with the Indians.
Fruit and vegetables, which had not been major items on the English table, reluctantly became a part of the diet. "They didn't consider them real food. In England, they had used them mostly as seasoning or decorations. But when they arrived in America, sometimes the choice was a vegetarian meal or no meal at all!"
Penner's section on meal preparation includes the seating arrangement ("Children and other less important people were near the foot of the table - `below the salt.' ") and the tableware such as plates were called trenchers and chargers. Bread was often used as a plate, thus the name of the book.
Almost no one, it seems, used a fork ("they thought forks were silly") but everyone had a spoon, which may have been made from clam shells attached to sticks, animal horns and those carved out of wood. Because of the scarcity of utensils, eating with fingers was acceptable. "The only rule was that you were supposed to wash them - or at least wipe them - before you stick them in the pot."
Penner has included some hints at what manners were expected from children at the dinner table. "When your meat is in your mouth, do not drink or speak or laugh." She also includes a Pilgrim menu with several recipes that are claimed to be authentic to the 1620s with directions for modern-day cooks. One such, "Swizzle," is a cooling drink of water, vinegar, molasses and spices that sounds a bit tart. I think I'll stick to cranberry juice.
Other books to add spice to the Thanksgiving feast would be Penner's "The Colonial Cookbook" (Hastings) and "Slumps, Grunts and Snickerdoodles: What Colonial America Ate and Why," by L. Perl (Clarion).