: [P-F] paleo ate both cooked and raw


> I have been reading about the Coast Indians (along the
Washington State
> Coast) and they ate both raw and cooked meat. They ate
their salmon roasted
> or raw/dried.  They ate sometimes the marrow raw of an
animal and cooked the
> rest. It seemed to be a combination of both
cooking/raw/dried meat. The head
> of a salmon, roasted on a stick, was considered a
delicacy.
>
> >
> >Or perhaps I would put it: I feel a closer (mystical? :-)
> >bond to my Paleolithic ancestors eating cooked meat!

REPY:

I lived on the Oregon and Washington Coast.     Those "Coast
Indians"  had all the clams anyone could eat, some also  had
oysters and they told the first explorers "Lewis and Clark"
that there were many Elk.   Also they ate whales.  Quite a
few bites on a whale.

We  lived several years about a mile from where Lewis and
Clark spent that really wet winter.  (Warrenton OR)  My
father dug clams;  {razor clams}  I walked along behind
filling a "Gunnysack" with clams that he flipped at me.  My
Mother cooked  clams dipped in Cornmeal batter,  I ate those
clams until I could burst may stomach.   YOU GUYS WILL NEVER
EXPERIENCE THAT !!   It was in 1935 to 1938!  Razor clams
cost about $50 a pound- now-  if you can find them.  And
they have to be cooked just right or they get tough as an
inner tube.

Years later:  We went to Neah Bay  WA.  (1965)  and caught
Salmon.   Mrs. Butler (A Makah Indian) ran a cannery and
smokehouse at Neah Bay.  We became good friends, .   She
smoked or slow cooked the Salmon.   It tasted so good that
we would eat most of it before we got home!

Well for those who have never been there--  Neah Bay is
about 120 Miles West of Seattle about three hours going west
on a weekday afternoon:  Or six hours returning  from Neah
Bay to Seattle on a Sunday afternoon.     We would finagle a
Friday off work and go to Neah Bay Thursday night.  that
took three hours.   Then Friday we took all the Salmon we
caught to Mrs. Butler.  ON Sunday we could pick it up smoked
because it took two days to smoke it.   NOW it was only 120
miles back to Seattle but ---First we had to wait with
several hundred other cars of fishermen to get on the "Hood
Canal Ferry"  ---So in that long line we ate the Smoked
Salmon for an hour or more.   Then it took another hour or
two to get on the Puget Sound Ferry --so we ate more Smoked
Salmon.   That is why it took six hour to go 120 miles.    I
would speculate that I ate several pounds of that smoked
Salmon each trip while waiting for those Ferries.

You will find this hard to believe --but we would catch  ten
or  twenty  Salmon  ( 5 to 15 lbs each) and have twenty  to
forty lbs smoked.  They did not last  a week smoked before
they got moldy or ?   This type of smoked Salmon loses its
flavor after a week..  Fortunately  the five of us could eat
it up in a few days!

This type of adventure is long gone now.    You may go to
Alaska or elsewhere and catch a Salmon,  but there will be
NO Mrs. Butler to smoke it for you!

Best Regards,    Lorenzo