4 Indigenous Food Recipes to Add to Your Table (2024)

These Laxota recipes will appeal to everyone at your table this holiday season

November is Native American Heritage Month and it’s an important opportunity to recognize and honor the original inhabitants of North America. Help kids (and their grown-ups) make that connection by filling their tummies with indigenous cuisine. These Native American recipes are also great for cooking with kids. We caught up with Chef Kimberly Tilsen-Brave Heart of Etiquette Catering in Rapid City, SD for some mouth-watering menu items that incorporate traditional Lakota ingredients.

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“As the original inhabitants of this land, it is important to teach all children the significance of indigenous foods, history, and existence,” says Chef Kimberly Tilsen-Brave Heart. “We all reside upon the ancestral lands of indigenous people.”

With full recipes below, Chef Tilsen-Brave Heart has curated a special menu for Native American Heritage Month and beyond. The following mouth-watering dishes incorporate ingredients like pumpkin and bison, which are major food staples for the Lakota people. You’ll also find foods like cranberries and rice that are also indigenous ingredients.

Magic Pumpkin Squash Soup

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Ingredients:

  • 1 large butternut squash

  • 1 tbsp. garlic powder

  • Kosher salt

  • Black pepper

  • Olive oil

  • 1 stick of butter

  • 1 medium yellow onion

  • 1 can organic pumpkin puree

  • 2 cups coconut milk

  • 4 cups chicken broth or vegetable stock

  • Roasted pumpkin seeds (for topping)

Instructions:

  1. Roast a large peeled and cubed butternut squash at 425 degrees for 20 minutes.

  2. Sprinkle with 1 tbsp of garlic powder, sprinkle kosher salt, and cracked black pepper

  3. Toss with olive oil and put in on a baking sheet before putting in the oven

  4. 1 stick of butter melted with a chopped medium yellow onion, sprinkle with some salt until translucent.

  5. Add 1 can of organic pumpkin puree

  6. Add 2 cups of coconut milk

  7. Add 4 cups of chicken broth or vegetable stock

  8. Add the roasted butternut squash

  9. Simmer for 30 minutes

  10. Then blend with an immersion blender

  11. Top with roasted pumpkin seeds

Related: 10 Ways to Honor Native American Heritage Month with Your Kids

Wild Rice, Cranberry, and Bison Stuffed Mushrooms

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Ingredients:

  • 1 lb ground bison

  • 1 lb Italian sausage

  • 3 tbsp. butter

  • 1 yellow onion

  • 6-8 baby portabella mushrooms

  • Qtr. cup dried cranberries

  • 1 cup wild rice {optional: purchase wild rice from: https://redlakenationfoods.com}

  • 2 cups bone broth or vegetable stock

  • Olive oil

  • Kosher salt

Instructions:

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees

  2. Melt 3 tbsp. of butter with a half-chopped yellow onion Sauté

  3. Wash and clean 6-8 baby portabellas remove stems and chop add to the butter and yellow onion

  4. Add qtr. cup of dried cranberries

  5. Add 1 cup of wild rice, and continue to saute all together (you are popping the wild rice, so it will become fragrant)

  6. Add 2 cups of bone broth or vegetable stock, lower heat, and cover to simmer; set timer for 25 minutes

  7. In another pan saute 2 tbsp of butter and the other half of your chopped yellow onion, cook until translucent

  8. Add 1 lb of ground bison, 1 lb of Italian sausage, and 1 tbsp of garlic

  9. Cook until brown over medium heat

  10. Add wild rice and bison mixture together

  11. Drizzle olive oil and sprinkle kosher salt over portabellas

  12. Stuff with bison wild rice mixture

  13. Bake for 15 minutes; serve warm

Related:

Bison Stew

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Ingredients:

  • 2 lbs buffalo meat

  • 3-4 tbsp. olive oil

  • 1 tbsp. garlic powder

  • 2 tbsp. kosher salt

  • 1 tsp. black pepper

  • 1 tsp. paprika

  • 1/2 tsp. turmeric

  • 3-4 bay leaves

  • Mirepoix (chopped onions, carrots, celery)

  • 6-8 cups of beef broth/stock or water

  • 6-8 russet potatoes

Instructions:

  1. Braise 2 lbs of Buffalo meat (1-inch cubes) with half an onion (fine chop), in a warmed stockpot with 3-4 tbsp. olive oil

  2. Spice 1 tbsp. garlic powder, 2 tbsp. kosher salt, 1 tsp. black pepper, 1 tsp. paprika, 1/2 tsp. turmeric, and 3-4 bay leaves

  3. After browned, add Mirepoix (chopped onions, carrots, celery), and a can of diced tomatoes

  4. Add 2 cups of water or stock/broth and simmer on medium-low heat for 30-45 mins or until tender. (Stir occasionally, more water or stick/broth may be needed) times will vary with the size of the meat and location

  5. When meat is tender add 6-8 cups of beef broth/stock or water and bring back to boil 6-8 russet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces or bigger

  6. Cook an additional 15-20 minutes until potatoes are fork-tender

  7. Remove from heat and let stand for 10-15 minutes, serve

Related:7 Places to Visit to Responsibly Experience Native American Culture

Buffalo, Cranberry, and Wild Rice Meatballs with Blackberry Wojape

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Ingredients:

Meatballs

  • 1 lb Buffalo (Can be substituted with beef)

  • 1/4 lb Italian Sausage

  • 1 cup Wild Rice

  • 1/2 cup Yellow Onion

  • 3 cups of Chicken Bone broth

  • 1/2 cup Rehydrated Cranberries

  • 2 Tbsp. Worcestershire Sauce

  • 1/4 cup Breadcrumbs (optional)

  • 1 egg

  • 1 tsp. Salt

  • 1 tsp. Garlic Powder

  • Dash of Paprika

Blackberry Wojape

  • 1 cup Berries

  • 1 cup Sugar

  • 1 1/2 cups Water

Instructions:

Meatballs

  1. Clean wild rice with cold water

  2. Saute wild rice with 1/2 cup of yellow onion and some oil for 5 minutes, allowing the rice to gently pop

  3. Add in 3 cups of bone broth per 1 cup of wild rice

  4. Add in rehydrated cranberries, cover, and simmer for 45 minutes

  5. Add in 1 cup finished wild rice to buffalo

  6. Add 2 tbsp. of Worcestershire sauce

  7. Add 1/4 cup of breadcrumbs (optional)

  8. Add 1 tsp. salt, 1 tsp. garlic powder, and a dash of paprika

  9. Place meatballs on a baking sheet with parchment paper and bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes or until internal temp is 165 degrees

Blackberry Wojape

  1. Add into a pan: 1 cup of berries (of your choosing), 1 cup of sugar, and 1 tbsp. of cornstarch and 1 1/2 cups of water

  2. Render down for about 10 minutes

  3. Drizzle blackberry wojape on top of the meatballs and enjoy

4 Indigenous Food Recipes to Add to Your Table (2024)

FAQs

What are the four types of indigenous food? ›

These include indigenous fruits, vegetables, tubers and roots.

What are traditional indigenous American foods? ›

Along with potatoes, many other foods—including corn, beans, squash, pumpkins, peppers, tomatoes, yams, peanuts, wild rice, chocolate, pineapples, avocados, papayas, pecans, strawberries, cranberries, and blueberries, to name a few, are indigenous to the Americas.

What is indigenous menu? ›

Indigenous cuisine is a type of cuisine that is based on the preparation of cooking recipes with products obtained from native species of a specific area. Food is prepared using indigenous ingredients of vegetable or animal origin in traditional recipes of the typical cuisine of a place.

What do indigenous people cook? ›

Common vegetables included corn, beans, and squash, which were often simmered to make soups or stews, such as Three Sister Soup (the "sisters" are corn, beans, and squash). Gath- ered foods included ground nuts, wild grapes, and fiddlehead ferns in the east and wild rice in Ontario and Manitoba.

What is indigenous culture food? ›

While diets vary from nation to nation, traditional foods consisted of those that could be gathered and hunted in the local area, and sometimes included agricultural products like corn, squash and beans, which were introduced before European influence on diets.

What are Native American foods now? ›

The “Magic Eight” — corn, beans, squash, chiles, tomatoes, potatoes, vanilla, and cacao — are eight plants that Native people gave to the world and are now woven into almost every cuisine. Like many cuisines, Native American cuisine is not static.

What three food items are Native to the USA? ›

For centuries, many Native American tribes throughout North America have cultivated corn, beans, and squash. The term 'Three Sisters' was primarily used by the Iroquois who live in the Northeastern United States and Canada.

What is the most popular indigenous food? ›

Some of the most well-known Indigenous foods are the Three Sisters—corn, beans, and squash—as they were staple foods.

What do Native Americans eat the most? ›

The three sisters (corn, beans, and squash) were the major staples of Native American agriculture, and were always grown together.

What is the #1 Indian dish? ›

1. Chicken Makhani (Butter Chicken) Butter chicken is mouth-watering, tender chicken, cooked in a spiced tomato sauce. It's traditionally cooked in a tandoor (a cylindrical clay or metal oven), but may be grilled, roasted or pan-fried in less authentic preparations.

What are the 4 indigenous methods of preserving food? ›

Four indigenous preservation techniques were commonly used. These include salting, drying, preboiling, underground preservation, river soil and wrapping using animal skin are also used.

What were the original 4 food groups? ›

A new food guide that also specified a foundation diet was released by USDA in 1956 (table 1). Popularly known as the “Basic Four,” the guide recommended a minimum number of foods from each of four food groups—milk, meat, fruits and vegetables, and grain prod- ucts (Page and Phipard, 1956).

What are the four different ways Native Americans got their food? ›

Depending on the tribe and the area they lived in, Native Americans got their food by different methods including farming, hunting, fishing, and gathering. Most tribes used a combination of these four ways to get their food, but many specialized in one area such as farming or hunting.

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