Lenape Food In The Lenape

FoodEdit

The Lenape tribes ate various kinds of food, including both vegetables and meat. Food had to be dried or eaten quickly because their modes of preservation were not as good as it is today. Hunting and fishing were very important because it was the only way to get food. Deer, elk, black bear, raccoon, beaver, and rabbit were among the animals hunted for meat, skins, and sinew. Bear fat was melted, purified, and stored in skin bags. Turkeys, ducks, geese, and other birds were also hunted for meat and feathers. A Bird 's their eggs were eaten for food. Marsh birds such as geese and ducks were killed with bows and arrows. They also were caught by using traps and nets.Birds, especially turkey, was favoured because women liked to use their

Lenape who lived near the ocean shore harvested and ate thousands of shellfish. The Lenape who lived along lakes, rivers and streams, gathered and ate freshwater mussels. Crayfish, a freshwater crustacean that looks like a small lobster, were caught in rivers and lakes, was also eaten.

Wild Plants Edit

Women and children would go into the fields and forests to gather plants, roots, berries, fruits, mushrooms, and nuts. Most of this food was eaten as soon as it was ripe. Sometimes there was so much plant food that the surplus could be dried and stored for the wintertime. In the spring, there were numerous berries,

Lenape weggies

Dries vegetables and plants including wild strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries. The roots of cattail plants and water lilies were eaten. Persimmons, cranberries, and wild plums were also eaten. Nuts such as walnuts, butternut, hickory nuts and chestnuts were gathered in early fall. Oak trees supplied many acorns, but acorns had a bitter taste. Lenape women discovered that they could remove the bitter taste by roasting the acorns or by crushing these nuts in a wooden mortar and rinsing them in hot water. Leached acorns were cooked into a porridge, or pounded into flour to make bread. Cooking oil was made from nuts by crushing and cooking them in boiling water. The nut oil floated to the top of the water where it was scooped out with spoons made from turtle shells or clam shells. The nut oil was stored in bottles or clay pots until