What Was on the Menu at the First Thanksgiving?
The history of the holiday meal tells us that turkey was always the centerpiece, but other courses have since disappeared
By Megan Gambino
November 21, 2011
Today, the traditional Thanksgiving dinner includes any number of dishes: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, candied yams, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie. But if one were to create a historically accurate feast, consisting of only those foods that historians are certain were served at the so-called “first Thanksgiving,†there would be slimmer pickings. “Wildfowl was there. Corn, in grain form for bread or for porridge, was there. Venison was there,†says Kathleen Wall. “These are absolutes.â€
Two primary sources—the only surviving documents that reference the meal—confirm that these staples were part of the harvest celebration shared by the Pilgrims and Wampanoag at Plymouth Colony in 1621. Edward Winslow, an English leader who attended, wrote home to a friend:
Read more:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-was-on-the-menu-at-the-first-thanksgiving-511554/#LLjlHqeIiUlZ4cwW.99
