Chapter 16
of Food

MENU

1_WORKING
2_THE POTATOES
3_ROOTHOUSE
4_CORN
5_PEAS
6_EMMER
7_FOOD PLAN
8_THE CAVE PLAN

1_WORKING

Many passes saw AMI and BOY working in their garden. Hoeing, raking and watering where and when needed. Clearing the garden of invaders was never ending. The fence kept out animals that would eat the shoots and new plants. Ahoo kept the birds away.

The fig tree produced many figs. Berries grew on side bushes. After a few returns their fruit trees flowered and were now producing fruit. Some were sweet, some were bitter. They were all good.

They had planted many seeds from the Garden in Harmony and encouraged those seeds they found. The first garden seeds had shown, all nicely in straight rows. Little shoots broke through the ground and sought Big-light. The shoots split into stems with little leaves and they carried the plants growing upwards and sideways. Then large green leaves appeared throughout the garden.

Flowers on many of the plants appeared and bees buzzed around the garden spreading the flower pollen to other flowers of their kind. AMI and BOY themselves pollinated many plants by brushing the pollen between the flower parts.

Then everywhere there had been a flower bulges appeared above and some within the ground. The bulges became food and there was a lot.

2_THE POTATOES

One row of plants that grew underground was planted steeped in mounds of dirt about a foot or two apart. Some had little white flowers appear among their leaves. Others had different coloured flowers. The bees were busy and I noticed some insects and the wind carried some pollen between the plants. The weather got cooler and they watched closely under the leaves for plant destroyers. They found the odd potato beetle that they picked and happily ate. They were tasty.

When the flowers were gone and the leaves died back they waited several decks and then dug the plants up with the two pronged ends of their spears. The leaves went into the pile to decompose and help the next garden grow, and the swelled tubers were harvested. All were potatoes but each plant seemed a different kind. Some had brown and rusty looking skins others red or white and some purple. Some were small, others much larger. They knew the potatoes were a valuable food, and they needed the best.

They totaled each plants volume of potatoes and they tasted each type. They kept those tastiest ones that would grow most and produce the best, and resist those forces that would destroy them. They would sort through the potatoes and the ones they wanted most were kept to replant. They replanted them in pieces throughout a new set of mounds in the larger garden.

Each piece they planted had over two nodules and a chunk of potato attached. The harvested potatoes would need to be stored.

3_ROOTHOUSE

BOY dug a deep pit in a sloped area near the cave and supported the walls with logs as well as a log floor. They were deep and he placed a roof of logs over the pit a few feet down from the surface. He covered the roof of logs with thick sod and some rocks. He made an opening at both ends and one opening connected with another small pit.

He loosely sealed the far end to allow air to flow through when needed and made a door for the entrance. The door was stuffed with dirt. He laid straw all over the inside and placed the potatoes on wooden branches. He said,

The potatoes will keep well for 10 decks or more in the cool ventilated air of the potato house. We can add other foods of the ground that will last. The potatoes will be food staple and food binder. Their skins with some honey will ease burns and we can make stronger glue, maybe even some drink of comfort.

AMI liked to eat them raw but she boiled them and they were delicious.

4_CORN

One long row of plants grew tall with long leaves. Little tassels grew through the bulges on the stalks. The tassels and the bulges grew wide and long with food. When they opened the first one it was corn and had different colours. They boiled the corn and salted it. It made so tasty meals.

They separated the corns as they had with the potatoes and found they had many types. They decided to re grow two types of corn. One was of many corns for each stalk and was sweet to taste. This would be for their food and Oink loved the cobs. The other type would make good feed for Snort and Oink and their kind. They could also make corn oil.

5_PEAS

They had put sticks around two rows of plants and the plants grew through the sticks and pods hung from their climbing vines. The pods ripened and bore large pods filled with foods. On one row were peas and their pods, a delicacy of taste. On the other row were beans, so tasty when boiled.

6_EMMER

There were three long rows of emmer, the grain of pan. When the grains were ready they cut the stalks with the grain and piled them in a pile like a tent to dry. When they were dry they grabbed handfuls of emmer stalks and beat them hard against a rocky area. The grains fell out. They took the grains and ground them on the grinding wheel. The powder could be cooked to make pan.

7_FOOD PLAN

AMI had found many plant cures and tastes and she kept them in a long row of sealed pots on a log shelf behind the hearth. They contained the leaves and stems and seeds and roots of plants that added different flavors to the foods. Many were of important body and medicinal use. Some could be steeped into teas to aid their life forms and living processes.

AMI thought a lot about how to make the taste. She mixed them and tasted them all. She learned all the tastes, the salt, the sweet, the cut, the bland and the pucker. Food could be more interesting than the plain tastes they had known. She would teach their children when they were curious how to make the tastes. She would teach them how to cook the foods and how to clean up everywhere. She wore a fiber apron to keep hot spills from her form.

BOY had built a hearth around the fire with metal grates over the top to hold a round metal pan with little edges around it. It looked a little like a wok. Food could be fried, fire baked, boiled, or even steamed.

Lightly salted fire baked potatoes, with boiled peas on top, mmm. A white smoke rose from the center of the potatoes and the peas slipped around on the fiber plant oil. Their smell made me think hungry.

They found that many foods could be dried by big-light and if they were sealed they would last a long time, many decks even. They would be kept in the cool back of the cave. Salt made many things last longer.

They made a small roof about three feet square and supported it on four corners with two foot posts. They made it on the ledge wall. The roof overhung the posts so no direct light would shine inside. They hung a loose screen of reeds under the roof and connected it to the corner posts.

Then they placed thin slices of foods on the screen to dry. The slow heat from the day would evaporate water from the food. The free circulation would allow any wind to blow the moisture away. The food became dried and could last a long time. They stored and labeled them in pots with their tops sealed with wax and some sealed with honey, to the back of the cave.

The abundant fruit came from well cared for trees and could be cut into slices. The slices were dried and stored. The peas, the corn, the beans and other vegetables could be dried. The cut fruit attracted small flies. They had to swat at the small flies and keep Oink away.

AMI made a flame with dried leaves of the yellow plant and it gave off a sweet smell. Wherever she placed it the small flies left. She made more and placed them around the food area and the flies and biting insects left. I guess they did not like the smell.

Then dried fish and little critters filled sealed pots and were also stored in the cool back of the cave. They needed all this food storage for events unknown and for all the growing mouths. Without the garden life would be very different. They knew that disaster could strike anytime and without food storage starvation could appear.

Then an event flashed before me. I saw the year most of the crops were wiped out and it was harder than most. A large hoard of flying hoppers appeared and blanketed the skies while passing through, devouring all crops not covered to the ground.

For such an event they had kept large stores of dried foods, and had built a root house to maintain tubers and other foods. They had large crocks full of grains and nuts while maintaining a large supply of feed stored for the animals in the sheds and under cover. They had the eggs and the milk and the honey.

That year they caught more fish in the creeks and foraged in areas the flying hoppers passed by. They learned how to ration the foods. All ate well, but a little less. That year was still a good year. They sang and made happy with their progress. I could see this was just the start of the foods and the cooking.

I watched them make clay pipe channels for waters and waste. They built a system to make hot water using a large clay vat attached to tubes of metal that ran through the hearth. The fire heated the cold water in the incoming pipe and it rose and returned to the vat through the return pipe. This drew more cold water in from the bottom and more hot water to the vat. They could lift the lid and ladle hot water from the top of the vat.

8_THE CAVE PLAN

Then I saw them making short walls of rock and logs in the cave to separate the cave into parts that each faced toward where the fire was, with the top open to the sky. They made fiber curtains to cover the doors. They built beds for the children, two to a room within the walls and a room behind to keep food and supplies in. Brave was the firstborn and he preferred to sleep out by the ledge with his spear and sling nearby. He loved the night sounds and sights.

They cleared dirt and made roads, and made wagons for their snorts to pull along. The snorts worked hard and rapidly helped change their world. They made saddles and rode snorts and played games from Snort backs.

They made drums from thin striplings and the pelts from the aggressive animals. They had carved flutes of bone and bamboo. They had made different strings to give notes to their sound. They found that by placing and tightening the different lengths of strings across a bow shaped bough the strings moved and each twanged a different note. They made music and sang many songs.

They built a tree house in the orchard between four trees. They made a rope ladder with knots tied into the rope for hand holds to climb up. It was safe above the ground.

They made pigments and coloured their world. The marks on the wall, the clothes, even their small drums, were coloured in designs of their world. All drums had a feather painted on with a hand grasping the end of the feather, the sign of greeting. They built a cave dwelling to meet their needs. They did it all as I watched. They had built Sanctuary.

They had rotating supplies of foods from different sources and they knew how to store their foods for harder times.

Time continued in this way in Of Child