As long as I've got the fryer fired up for KFC chicken experiments, I figured I should try some fry bread. So I ran across Native American fry bread recipes from a variety of tribes. They're all a little different, yet the same in one unusual way. Here's a typical one. Blackfeet 4 cups flour 1 Tbsp. powdered milk 1 Tbsp. baking powder 1 tsp. salt 1-1/2 cups warm water Oil for frying Or Chickasaw 2 cups sifted flour 1/2 tsp. salt 4 tsp. baking powder 1 egg 1/2 cup warm milk I'm thinking these are definitely post-contact recipes. Way, way post-contact. They originally could have had warm water, and possibly salt. The wheat flour, baking powder, egg, milk, and powdered milk probably came later, as did the cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla, and brown sugar in the Chickasaw pumpkin bread recipe.
Acorn flour was mixed with cornmeal and sometimes cattail flour, then baked in a clay over or directly in ashes. They would also mix dried crushed beans with cornmeal to form dough balls, which were boiled. Native American fry bread was "invented" by the Navajo in 1864 using ingredients supplied by the US government. It's likely that someone from Italy, Hungary, or Bulgaria showed them how to make it.
The same cultural appropriation is a so why Spam has usurp native Chamarro cuisine in Guam and why it's its own food group in Hawaii. Thanks, U.S. Marines! As for the fry bread, I would think you could add cornmeal to any of those, no? My family used to make hot water cornbread, which was basically cornmeal and salt mixed with hot water and dumped into hot oil and topped with butter. I bet you could substitute some of the flour for cornmeal and still taste awesome.
Frybread is the best thing ever. The Navajo (Diné) people got the ingredients from the Spanish colonizers/Mexicans between 1600s-1800s. I say Mexicans because in this area now known as the states New Mexico and Arizona, prior to 1848 it was Mexico. Mexico's loss in 1848 got the United States Arizona, Nevada, California, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado. New Mexican food is unique. Diné food is truly a treat. Fry bread is my crack. It's made the same as a sopapilla except it's pulled instead of rolled with a rolling pin, allowing it to be thick and fluffy. It's super good with honey or sugar, or as a Navajo Taco. Put pinto beans, ground beef, cheese, lettuce, tomato.... Red chile (not chili! This ain't Texas!) and there ya go. Tradicional Diné food is truly something. Blood sausage, mutton stew, specific foods associated with ceremonies related to life cycles.... I have only been able to have mutton stew, myself. It's delicious and greasy. Alkaan: http://navajotimes.com/entertainment/2013/0713/072513lif.php Blue corn mush: http://navajorecipes.com/corn/blue-corn-mush-easy/
I could really use the tribe making NDN tacos today. Instead I have to put up with ham and noodles. :/
my understanding is that (up here, at least) fry bread shows up around the early 1830s from Scots and to a lesser extent Irish influences, hence the gaelic sounding name "Bannock". Probably safe to say that much like dumplings, every culture has some variation of fry bread.
