Parched corn

[Nativearizonan]

I've seen that term, in fact Kephart used it in his description of his use of parched corn. Problem is, I've never seen it in the old literature, and am cautious it might be a more modern term.

Spence

I just finished reading an account by a Captain Carr of the US Cavalry, stationed at Fort McDowell, Arizona Territory, in 1866, who describes pinole and it as part of the daily rations. It is on p-19 of this volume here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu-E-sd3H2w

I've seen it talked in other sources, and I'm pretty sure the use of the word by Americans dates back to at least the time of the Mexican War, but I will have to look around to find a reference to it from an earlier time period than the one above.

 

[Nativearizonan]

Here is a reference from 1862:

HEADQUARTERS ADVANCE GUARD CALIFORNIA VOLUNTEERS,

PIMOS VILLAGES, May 5, 1862.

LIEUTENANT: The following scale of prices has been agreed upon with the Indians:

Four quarts flour, weighing four and one quarter pounds, for one yard manta.

Seven quarts wheat, weighing thirteen pounds, for one yard manta.

Four quarts pinole, weighing five and one half pounds, for one yard manta.

Fifty pounds hay or one hundred and fifty pounds of green fodder, for one yard manta.

These prices are much for the interest of the Government, and it is to be hoped that the facilities for purchasing of the Indians will enlarge. Manta may be called the staple of article for them, but such goods as were asked for by the Colonel commanding, in his letters of December, 1861, on the Mojave expedition, are indispensably necessary for the practice of an economy of great advantage. The daily consumption of the present command for forage is as follows:

Yards manta.

280 horses, wheat 12 pounds, 3,360 303 ½

65 mules, wheat 9 pounds, 585 } 3,945 pounds, equals

345 animals, hay 14 pounds, 4,830 pounds, equals 96 ½

Daily consumption of manta 400

Not enough flour to make mention of has been brought in, and pinole is an article of small consumption, unless of necessity. A brief observation of these people and their habits shows me that they are disinclined to sell their produce or any other property unless the article offered in exchange is such as they habitually and at the moment need. I do not believe that they would trade wheat for more manta than what they wanted for the moment, and further, that after twenty thousand yards of that goods have been distributed among them it would cease to be a ready currency. These opinions may be erroneous; my experience with the people has been of less than a week’s duration, and that with only promises to offer in payment. Obligations for near three thousand yards manta are already outstanding from the Quartermaster and Commissary Departments. Even without any increase of the command, the ten thousand yards daily expected at the post will be exhausted by the twentieth instant. If, when the manta arrives, the Indians do not bring in their wheat more freely (the animals only get half rations to-day) I see no recourse but to enter their wheat fields and cut the grain for forage. As yet negotiations for purchasing their standing grain have not been consummated. I enlarge more upon the difficulties of getting supplies here with reference to the part of the expedition that is in my rear than to the command now here. I am anxious to see a supply on hand for an advance, and shall endeavor to accomplish it.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

J.R. WEST,
Lieutenant-Colonel, First Infantry California Volunteers, Commanding.
To BENJ. C. CUTLER, First Lieutenant and Acting Assistant Adjutant-General, District of Southern California.

 

[Nativearizonan]

The word Pinole is used by the Spaniard Diego Perez de Luxan (Espejo Expedition of 1582-83). He mentions it at least 8 times in his account.

 

[Black Hand]

Does he give a description of Pinole?

 

[Nativearizonan]

@ Black Hand, I'll get back to you on that in my next post.

Also:

I found pinole referenced by Audubon on his 1849-50 Western Journal, as having been purchased for provisions in Northern Mexico. He also talks about the Papago Indians (Tohono O-odham) mixing pinole with ground up dry grasshoppers, and it was considered by those who tried it as pretty good. He describes pinole as being parched wheat or corn. I've seen other references to pinole as toasted seeds of various kinds, so the word had a pretty wide meaning.

 

[Nativearizonan]

From the Hammond/Rey translation of Luxan. These quotes were scattered throughout, and each one was from a different location and in meeting with different people:

"They brought us turkey cocks and hens, beans, maize, calabashes (squash), and raw and toasted pinole."

"In all these pueblos they presented us with turkeys, maize, beans, and pinole."

"This pueblo was called Cachiti (todays Cochiti). The people are very peaceful. They gave us maize, tortillas, turkeys, and pinole."

"We camped close to a pueblo of the peaceful Quires nation. Here they gave us turkeys, maize, pinole, and other things which we needed."

"Hardly had we pitched camp when about one thousand Indians came laden with maize, ears of green corn, pinole, tamales, and firewood, and they offered it all, together with six hundred widths of blankets small and large, white and painted, so that is was a pleasant sight to behold."

"Upon their arrival over one thousand souls came laden with very fine earthen jars containing water, and with rabbits, cooked venison, tortillas, atole, beans, cooked calabash, abundant maize and pinole, so that although our friends were many and though we insisted they should not bring so much, heaps of it were left over."

"In the main plaza where there was a cross newly erected and whitewashed, with an inscription after Spanish custom with many feathers and much pinole scattered over the sign and ground."

"They were asked to give us some pinole and they replied that they had none."

"This brought us no joy as men who had eaten nothing but pinole."

Sorry, no descriptions of it.

 

[George]

...they can subsist several days upon a little rockahominy, which is parched Indian corn, reduced to powder: This they moisten in the hollow of their hands, with a little water, and it is hardly credible how small a quantity of it will support them... With this slender subsistence, they are able to travel very long journeys. But then to make themselves amends, when they do meet with better cheer, they eat without ceasing, until they have revelled themselves into another famine.
The Sportsman's Cabinet, and Town and Country Magazine: A Periodical Devoted to the Genuine Sports of the Field, and Interesting Illustrations of Natural History Indispensably Connected with the Ramifications of the Chase, the Turf, the Stream, &c. &c. with Amusing and Instructive Anecdotes, and Elegant Engravings, Volume 1
Thomas Burgeland Johnson
Sherwood, Gilbert and Piper, 1833

I believe you will find the original if this is from William Byrd's Histories of the Dividing Line betwixt Virginia and North Carolina, 1729.

Spence

 

[Black Hand]

Good to know. Thanks Spence!

 

[Nativearizonan]

The Audubon references are on pages 145 and 150 on this text:
https://books.google.com/books?id=...6AEIPTAD#v=onepage&q=pinole corn 1850&f=false

 

[tenngun]

Townsend next vid on you tube now with ground parched corn ate on own, cooked in to gruel, and ash cake. With a little salt and maple I bet it would be very tasty high calorie and handy on the trail.

 

[George]

I've tested rockahominy simply dry with a little maple sugar added, and eaten with a little water...



...and simmered into a simple gruel.



Both were very tasty and satisfying. I think the old boys hit on a good one.

Spence

 

[coloradoclyde]

So glad I lived during the Culinary Revolution...instead of the American Revolution.. :haha:

 

[Claude Mathis]

From the dictionary...

noun
a sweetened flour made from ground dried corn mixed with flour made of mesquite beans, sugar, and spices.

The main species grown was Salvia columbariae, golden chia, the seeds of which were roasted and ground, to form a meal called pinole , then mixed with water so that the meal swelled into a glutinous mushy mess.

In 1690, Alonso de Leon noted the use of ”˜pots and casserole dishes,’ filled with beans, corn, and pinole , made of powdered corn and sugar.

 

[Nativearizonan]

Undoubtedly chia would make a more satisfying pinole than corn, although I can't see much reason to parch it. A spoonful of raw chia, swallowed with water will swell in your stomach until you feel like you ate a meal. It is also of a higher nutritious content than corn.

Amaranth was also used in pinole, although it doesn't have same swelling properties chia does.

Chia grows wild in the desert Southwest but would have to have been traded further north, and I don't remember ever reading about any such trading taking place, although some trade of it undoubtedly took place somewhere in the SW.

Perhaps, with the taking of the SW by Anglo-Americans, the definition of the term pinole was shifted, at least in American circles, to strictly parched corn, rather than any seed, because it was the parched corn that was readily acceptable to the traders, trappers, and military personnel that first entered the area. Pinole and panela (cane sugar in loaf form) is not much different than the parched corn and maple sugar the Americans were used to.

 

[Claude Mathis]

Undoubtedly chia would make a more satisfying pinole than corn, although I can't see much reason to parch it.

Perhaps for flavor and texture? The same reason we roast almonds, pine nuts, etc.?

 

[coloradoclyde]

Many nuts are/were roasted to kill insect eggs and larvae that would soon hatch and devour the crop...
Roasting /parching/ drying....also serve as a preservation method as well as making the food more palatable...

 

[Black Hand]

... as well as making the food more palatable...

And edible.
I've parched several different grains - Corn, Barley, Rice, Wild rice (technically a grass) - and all can be eaten after parching, but not before...

As an aside - Wild rice requires about 2 hours (or more) of simmering/cooking until it is soft enough to eat. When parched, it can be eaten as is and takes minutes of boiling before becoming soft in a stew.

 

[Nativearizonan]

I have a bunch of 15 year old chia seeds, unparched but kept indoors in the pantry. They still sprout like crazy if a few wet seeds stick to the inside of a glass. I'm sure you could still use them to make chia pets if you had such a desire. I doubt they would have been parched to preserve them, as it seems unnecessary, but they may be more palatable. I've never tried parching them but will have to do that and report back later.

They are easily edible raw and most people just mix them with water and drink them or make a pudding out of them.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Parched barley?

Tell me more.... :grin:

It makes a nice coffee substitute if you roast it....but I have never eaten it "parched"

 

[Billnpatti]

I read somewhere that 3 spoonfuls of parched meal and a canteen of water was sufficient to sustain a traveler for an entire day. Unfortunately, I do not recall where I saw this.

Maybe not what you saw, but...

[nocake]... is Indian corn parched in the hot ashes, the ashes being sifted from it; it is afterwards beaten to powder and put into a long leatherne bag trussed at the Indian's backe like a knapsacke, out of which they take three spoonfuls a day."
William Wood 1634

That was quoted by Horace Kephart, “Camping and Woodcraft”.

Spence

Sounds like a bare subsistence ration. It is probably why you didn't see any fat Indians....or fat pioneers, for that matter. :haha: I think I might need just a bit more on my plate. I usually end up with more than that on my napkin. :hmm: