One of the most common recipes for the Mohawk and other tribes in Canada is bannock. It tastes particularly good with blueberries or strawberries on top.
Basic Bannock
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3 tbsp margarine/butter
2 tbsp skim milk powder (optional)
Sift together the dry ingredients. Cut in the margarine until the mixture resembles a coarse meal (at this point it can be sealed it in a ziplock bag for field use). Grease and heat a frying pan. Working quickly, add enough COLD water to the pre-packaged dry mix to make a firm dough. Once the water is thoroughly mixed into the dough, form the dough into cakes about 1/2 inch thick. Dust the cakes lightly with flour to make them easier to handle. Lay the bannock cakes in the warm frying pan. Hold them over the heat, rotating the pan a little. Once a bottom crust has formed and the dough has hardened enough to hold together, you can turn the bannock cakes. Cooking takes 12-15 minutes.
Sounds good to me. I like blueberries, strawberries, raspberries (just about every fruit, except...grapefruit).
I am going to save the recipe...will let you know how it turns out when I make it.
:-)
thanks
Great recipe ,almost like a scone mixture, so they are plain then you add the topping I bet you could eat them with cheese,and a slice of meat ..
Does it just taste good or is this used as medicine. I never heard of bannock, but sounds similar to what we call bisquits.
That recipe sounds great! Thanks Nat! :)
Bannock isn't medicine, it's just food but it's good = )
Most Native healers use a holistic system. If two people who are coughing and sneezing go to a healer, the healer will likely give different medicines to each person because they are two different people with different bodies, mind, emotions and spirits. This is based on the Medicine Wheel - a type of "teaching tool". That's just a basic explanation but we believe in balance and if one area is out of balance, the entire person is effected - like a wheel with a broken spoke - if one is broken, the wheel doesn't work right.
Whatever medicines are used are also determined by the illness.
It sounds like I'm giving a lecture = (
I was just looking through the book 'Magic Medicine of the Indians" it says that the water melon seeds boiled and made into Tea are a cure for kidney trouble. Tea made from the Blackberry root cures Disentery ...This is one of the old collectable books I have although its only a paperback..
Holistic medicine fascinates me and makes much more since than popping a pill! It makes sense tho, the balance thing. I have been doing research and discovered that it is a good idea to take activated charcoal these days as a preventative, as you never know if your gonna eat something bad! They say half the time you think you are sick, you actually have food poisoning. Ugh!
The camus plant can be used to control diabetes. But camus comes in blue and yellow and one is poison - I can't remember which one. For almost every healing plant there is a poison "sister" plant. I've heard of charcoal being used on humans and non-humans who have eaten something bad or ODed but not as a preventive. That's interesting. In the old times we used charcoal on the BBQ = ) It's not surprising that food poisoning is so common now that GMOs are used so frequently. You think you're eating a tomato when in reality the "tomato" contains fish or pork genes. It isn't labelled as far as I know.
I've used wormwood for stomach problems. That book sounds interesting.
It is lonewolf theres some good stuff in it ,and its real research not made up stuff ,dated 1973 all about the medicines and herbs used by native Americans ..
I have heard Plantain is used a lot by Native People in medicine. A Native man who works with herbal medicine once told me that if you have an infection in the skin, to chew up a couple of Plantain leaves to a mush, then spit them out, and bind them to the infection with a bandage.
Well I can say it works! In the summer I got bitten by some horrible insect while I was in the woods. Bite lumps came up (nothing unusual about that) but after a few hours my arm swelled. In the morning it was worse. Benadryl helped but didn't get rid of the swelling all up my arm. I got the Plantain leaves, and did make a poultice and applied it over the area which had been bitten, and kept refreshing the bandage every 6 hours or so, and the next day everything was OK. No antibiotics needed, or any other drugs.
I've never heard of Plantain being used as a medicine. I've used bear fat for insect bites or even infected scratches and it does work. Can't kill a bear just for the fat - bears are powerful "symbols" for more northern tribes; all living things are important really.
I know next to nothing of these kinds of things...interesting....glad you talked about it :-)))
Hi;
I was wondering if the elder healers (holistic medicine), also treat people that are not living on a reserve, and how would you find one?
Second question - my name is Chenoa, it is Native American, Im sure you must know what it means, but which tribe does it originate from, I have always been curious about this?
Thanks for the info in advance!
Native healers, medicine women (and men) do treat people off the reserve. There are a lot of Natives living in urban areas. You can find them through Friendship Centers or other Native organizations. I have no idea what tribe your name comes from - there are so many tribes. Have you tried a google search? If I find out what your name means and what tribe it comes from, I'll let you know = )
Well my names means white dove, from what I have recently heard it is Mohawk, but that is what I am not sure of, I have heard other tribes. It is from one of the tribes area that I live in, which is Southwest Ontario Canada.
Hope that helps, didnt find much on Goggle?
Thanks!
I'm in Toronto which is (sort of) Mohawk territory although not as much as Brantford and a few other places, including the USA. Some websites aren't too reliable when it comes to anything Native. White Dove is a lot better sounding than my name. My childhood name translated into Baby Crawling Bird or Staggering Baby Bird. My adult name is only used in ceremonies but it isn't Dances With Wolves or shih tzus = )
I often wonder, when people ask me what my name is, whether I should say White Dove, because that is the English version, or give my Indian name Chenoa, and apply for Indian status...LOL, anything to screw up the government.
Its funny that when I tell people my name is Indian they always say, oh yeah you look like you are Indian?
What kind of ceremonies are in the Toronto area?
When we drove up to Brockville last weekend, we went through Shannonville, which is primarily Indian, it was cool to see the statues they put along the highway with the slate rock.
Chenoa is a lovely name. It sounds beautiful, even without knowing what it means. It reminds me of a misty morning with fir trees beside a lake :-)
Oh boy! You got me waxing poetic now!
It means White Dove, so you were close with your outdoor idea...LOL
I am often asked if my parents were hippies, but they werent. My father worked for the armed forces and spent a lot of time up north (Moosonee Ontario, Shannonville Ontario etc), I figure he met a woman there named Chenoa that he liked, and named his daughter after her - he was that type of a guy.
Problem is, with a name like Chenoa, you cant get away with much, everyone remembers a name like that, caused me a lot of grief in high school - maybe I should just tell people my name is White Dove, I can just imagine the reactions...LOL
Ginger is a beautiful name as well.
We have "spirit names" that are only used in ceremonies. My real name is Natalie - I don't think I would ever look like a White Dove - maybe Crazy Horse and yes I am just kidding.
LOL....Crazy Horse!!! Natalie is a pretty name too, like Ginger and Chenoa (White Dove).