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The Pilgrims' Real Thanksgiving Menu Colonial America (1492-1776)

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The Pilgrims' Real Thanksgiving Menu
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Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 4 to 6
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	6.75

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		bluefish, liverwort, prim, watercress, yarrow, individually, traditional, fowl, original, herring, phrase, interesting, venison, nutmeg, seafood, gravy
	content words:		Most Popular Way, Cook Award

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The Pilgrims' Real Thanksgiving Menu By Colleen Messina

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¹     If you could go back in time to 1621 and attend the first Thanksgiving dinner, you might expect to see Pilgrims and Indians eating turkey, cranberries, and pumpkin pie. The traditional picture of the Pilgrims' Thanksgiving is interesting, but sadly, it's not true. Learning about the original Thanksgiving meal gives us new reasons to be thankful.
 
²     What do you think of first when you think of Thanksgiving? Turkey! The Pilgrims had turkey, but other meats and wild fowl took center stage. Venison, or deer, was served, along with ducks, geese, passenger pigeons, and even swans. Meats were likely cooked by boiling or roasting over an open fire. Large birds were likely boiled, while smaller birds were cooked on a spit over a fire. Someone, usually a child, had the important but boring (and hot!) job of sitting by the spit and making sure that the meat cooked evenly. Another menu item that the Pilgrims served was seafood. They ate cod, bass, herring, bluefish, and eels. Clams, lobsters, mussels, and oysters were probably on the menu, too.
 
³     Pilgrim children probably didn't hear the phrase "eat your vegetables" too much. The Pilgrims had only a few kinds of vegetables at Thanksgiving, like squash, beans, and dried Indian corn called maize. There were no potatoes for mashed potatoes. They didn't have hot buttered rolls because they didn't have wheat flour or butter. They may have had cornbread.

Paragraphs 4 to 7:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

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Colonial America (1492-1776)

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