Show INDIANS GAVE NUTS TO AMERICAN MENU value as part of diet recognized in early times washington D C at this time of the year nut bowls filled with nuts fresh ind and salted shelled and unshelled cd are as much an adornment of the dining table as bowls of f ruit fruit nuts have been on the american menu since colonial times says the national geographic society the earliest americans invited indians to their feasts their contribution trib ution to the festive board was nuts corn and wild game from prehistoric times indians of north america have appreciated the value of nuts and have used them to supplement their diet the indian in the role of seems strange yet he found so ao many uses for hickory nuts alone that hat he cultivated hickory groves ile he not only ate the nuts but drank hickory milk made by pouring water over pulverized nuts or the ground press cake and used it in cooking hominy and corn cakes and as gravy on sweet potatoes pecans favorites pecans which have been growing wild for centuries in moist lowlands of the southern united states and merico menico were also favorites with american indians later pecans furnished nourishment for early mississippi settlers and were one of their first articles of commerce in the fur traders carried pecans along with their beav erskins to new york where some were sl shipped Lipped to england and france murmuring pines in the southwest and in mexico still provide indians and mexicans with edible nuts long before spanish monks marched up the western coast establishing their missions indians depended for food partly on nuts of the scrubby pinon tree of arizona and new mexico and tribes of western nevada once fought long bloody battles over pinon nuts hatchets were not buried until the territory was definitely divided to give each a share of pinon woods the expression from soup to nuts implies that nuts are merely dainties to top a feast whereas to many people they are the feast itself nuts are one of the richest foods grown their protein is of good quality but because of their high fat content they are used interchangeably ter changeably with other fatty foods food such as cream butter or bacon many inhabitants of india and japan substitute nuts and legumes entirely for meats chestnuts scarce the chestnut bark disease which has destroyed most of the native chestnut trees in the eastern united states has greatly limited american ican acquaintance with these nuts few of recent generations in the united states have seen the large spiny burrs with their velvety linings and recognize the glossy bright brown nuts only as stuffing in thanksgiving turkeys or as tasty morsels bought from street vendors on frosty mornings but in other parts of the world chestnuts are a valued food in some japanese mountain regions they almost usurp the po tatos place in france where the trees grow thickly these large nutritious nuts are prized as vegetables in the humblest cottage and in the finest chateau dawn sees great streets dotted with vendors carrying pails of hot steamed chestnuts working people flock to them for their breakfast others munch sweet heavy flat cakes something like oat cakes made from chestnut flour in one kind of chestnut bread the holes are as large as in swiss cheese in much of southern europe chestnuts form the chief winter diet of poor people who often make two meals a day from them the nuts are served in a number of ways steamed and eaten with salt or milk roasted or made into stews puddings and bread europeans also eat large quantities of almonds walnuts hazelnuts tried fried in oil and pickles made from immature walnuts california growers annually export many tons of green english walnuts largely to england to be pickled |