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| Pheasant with Elderberry Reduction and Hazelnuts |
Introduction:
This Sites of
Forage post will be tackling one of the most influential social factors that affect
knowledge about wild, foraged food (WFF) – gender. In this discussion, we will
see a disparity in wild food acquisition where men typically partake in hunting
while women are usually the foragers who collect wild plant foods. In the
spirit of this duality, the recipe this week combines these two wild food
groups. Granted, Sites of Forage (as the name implies) is geared to focus on
foraged foods (in other words, gathered foods) rather than hunted foods. But
after all, Sites of Forage is all about having a little something for
everybody. So, I figured why not take the occasion to combine hunted and gathered
wild food in this week’s recipe for those interested in wild meat.
That being said, I’ve
only ever been hunting one time in my life – if you can even call it hunting.
It was more like going into a field and shooting a dozen bullets to kill one
rabbit. Then shooting only nine bullets to kill a second rabbit. Call it
beginners luck, but I’m pretty sure I qualify now to compete in the biathlon for
the next winter Olympics.
So my caveat is
this: I am no professional when it comes to hunting, but I still have an
appreciation for wild meat and love to cook with it. Back home, I was really
lucky to have friends and neighbors who hunted for real and were always nice
enough to give me whatever cuts of meat from whatever animal they had. If you
don’t know anyone who hunts or are not a hunter yourself, fear not! You would
be surprised at the selection of wild meat available in the supermarket. For
the recipe in this post, I bought a pheasant from the freezer section in
Kaufland of all places. If you still can’t find wild meat or even if it’s just
not your thing, you can always substitute with something you are more familiar
with. To be completely honest, as delicious as the pheasant was, chicken is
much less fussy to cook with and would make for an equally delicious dish.
Nonetheless, I encourage you to cook with wild meat to try something new and
tasty as well as to diversify your repertoire in the kitchen.
______________________________________________________________________________
Foraging:
In the Field
Here’s the thing
about pheasant (and actually many wild meats in general), it kind of tastes
like chicken. But it also kind of tastes like funky chicken. The struggle is
real when it comes to gaminess, but there are many things that you can do to
combat this. As exhibited in the recipe, one of these ways is to marinade the
meat in some sort of acid (in our case, lemon juice). This acidity tends to cut
through the gaminess without covering up the flavor of the meat itself.
That being said,
doing only this means that you now have sour, slightly less funky chicken on
your hands. Another key to combatting the gamy flavor while at the same time complimenting
the sourness is with the introduction of something sweet. For this reason, you’ll
often see gamier meats paired with fruits. Duck à l’orange is a good example. In
Germany, a common pairing I see on menus is wild boar or goose with
lingonberries (Preiselbeeren).
So for our foraged
ingredient this week, we will be taking a look at one of the less common
foraged fruits: elderberries. In Germany, elderflower is no stranger and can be
found in products like Holundersirup which is used to make the cocktail Hugo.
However, you rarely see the berries that the flowers turn into later on in
the season. But elderberries have a very unique flavor that still maintains
some of the floral qualities of the flowers. They’re not very pleasant to eat
raw, but are delicious when cooked down to a dark, syrupy reduction with a bit
of sugar.
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| Elderberries (Sambucus nigra) |
When foraging for
elderberries, look for clusters of dark purple to black berries that hang from
trees in hand-shaped clusters. Do not pick any similar-looking berries that
stick straight up out of a bush or hang in columns – these are some poisonous
false friends. But in fact the edible elderberries are easy to distinguish from
their toxic cousins, so you shouldn’t have to worry too much. Once you collect
about 5 of these clusters, it’s time to head to the kitchen.
In the Kitchen
Begin by separating the berries from the stems. As with all foraged
food, wash very thoroughly. Transfer the berries into a small saucepan with 500
ml of water and bring to a boil. Simmer the berries, mashing occasionally with
a fork, for about 20 minutes or until the berries have released all they have
to offer into the water to form a dark purple infusion. Strain the liquid
through a fine sieve, pressing the remaining solid bits against the sieve to
squeeze out any juice. Heat this liquid once again with 250 ml sugar until the
sugar dissolves and the mixture reduces and you are left with a dark purple, syrupy
reduction. In this form, you can inject elderberry flavor into dishes without
any of the bitterness in their raw form.
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| Elderberry Reduction |
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Gender and WFF Knowledge:
This week, we will be discussing how gender acts within the social
context of a locale to affect WFF knowledge. First of all, it is important to
acknowledge the overwhelming trend that WFF knowledge is mostly held by women[1].
Therefore, we will begin by looking into the likely reasons why this trend
exists by drawing upon examples of sexual divisions of labor, the development
of specialization, and how the environmental aspects of a space affect the
foraging practices among men and women. Along the way, it will become clear how
these aspects affect the knowledge systems in certain locales as well as the
stakes they create in the field of ethnobotany as a whole.
Sexual Division of Labor and Specialization
To begin, we will look
towards the sexual division of labor in foraging practices. Researchers
conducting a study in Sardinia remarks that about 82% of their informants were
women, which they claim is common among ethnobotanical studies in Italy[2].The
researches attribute this “as a consequence of the importance of women in the
domestic context, which is where most plant resources […] are managed”[3].
This is one potential reason why we see this divide in labor and may apply to
many other locales where women are also in charge of domestic responsibilities.
But foraging falling into the domain of domestic duties is not as straight
forward as one might think.
An analysis
focusing on the human sexual division of foraging labor in multiple sites
across the world shed light on why foraging societies exhibit this divide
between men and women. It explains that women in these communities are tasked
with the important responsibilities of raising children and consequently focus
on food acquisition that is compatible with reproduction and childcare[4].
Therefore, women mostly partake in the gathering of wild plants, which is a
practice that provides a reliable income of food for the household[5].
Men, on the other hand, consequently tend to focus on those foods that women do
not target in their foraging practices in order to supplement the rest of the
diet[6].
This takes the form of hunting and fishing which, although difficult to acquire
and not as reliable, provide energy-dense foods that complement their wives’
steady supply of reliable food in a symbiotic relationship[7].
In addition, these modes of food acquisition are often dangerous, and these
foraging societies do not want to risk injuring or losing women who occupy the
important task of raising children[8].
As a result, the division of foraging labor between the sexes is seen as
beneficial to households via this symbiotic exchange of foods between men and
women[9].
However, the study
proposes another theory behind men’s focus on hunting and fishing other than
supplementing their wives’ gathered foods by highlighting the potential to
signal additional mates[10].
Since hunted foods are difficult to acquire but seen as prized and may be
shared beyond the household among the community, men have the opportunity to
showcase to potential mates their “phenotypic quality”[11].
Essentially, if you are a man and come back to the village with a slain wild
boar, then you are more likely to get the favored attention of all the ladies
and coincidentally Obélix.
But the author
makes an important remark that these two theories behind men’s motivation to
focus their attention on these foods are not mutually exclusive[12].
A wife and her household would be much more satisfied if her husband brought
home a wild boar rather than something she could gather herself, and the attention
of potential mates and Obélix can still be won over at the same time.
In addition, this
sexual division of labor by focusing on different methods of food acquisition
has consequences that further deepen the divide in practices. The study points out
that dividing foraging labor between the sexes opens up the inevitability of
specialization[13].
By focusing on specific tasks and methods – whether they be gathering,
processing, hunting, fishing, etc. – women and men begin to specialize in their
respective methods and thus consolidate these practices into this division of
labor[14].
Consequently, this specialization leads to increased skill level, which results
in higher success rates of obtaining food[15].
The development
and the use of tools play a particularly important role in specialization,
since one must actively learn and develop skill to master the use of a certain
technology[16].
This is especially the case for women who – responsible for processing and
cooking food – become particularly specialized with their imbedded knowledge of
using multiple tools. However, the author points out that tools can also serve
to counteract this division of labor. For example, “societies with the lowest
division of labor […] would appear to be those with considerable fishing (due
most likely to marine resources and technologies compatible with infant
raising)”[17].
In addition to these fishing societies, there are also instances where “males
and females hunt together. In these cases it is probably the use of a net (a special
tool) […] that explains the overlap”[18].
In the above
discussion, we see how this sexual division of labor consequently affects the
production and circulation of knowledge within these communities. By
specializing in their respective foraging practices, not only is there a sexual
division of labor but also a sexual division of knowledge. In the case of
women, performing foraging practices by gathering plants, specializing in the
knowledge gained and performed through these practices, and mastering the
imbedded knowledge of using specific tools result in women’s dominance over
foraging practices – as opposed to hunting, in most cases – and thus a
concentration of WFF knowledge among women develops.
This provides a
more coherent reason why this trend exists that WFF knowledge is largely
reserved for women. But, to what extent this trend applies to a given locale
still remains in question. To shed light on this, scrutinizing the environmental
characteristics of a specific site reveals that space plays a particular role
in forming varying specializations among men and women – consequently resulting
in varying divergences of WFF among gender.
Environmental Aspects
To
methodologically determine the environment of a given space, net primary
production (NPP) is a useful analytical tool. According to the same study about
the human sexual division of foraging labor, NPP “reflects the amount of new
growth in plants and is relevant for human diets because […] we tend to eat new
growth, whether seeds, fruits, leaves, or animals that depend on new growth”[19].
This essentially translates to high NPP means that there are many plant foods
to gather, whereas environments with low NPP have few. Since females are
generally restricted to gathering plants in their food acquisition because of
child care, males must adjust their practices to be the most efficient in the
NPP level of their environment[20].
In response to this need, we see variations in the trend that gathering is
restricted to women whereas men typically focus on hunting and fishing.
To illustrate
this, if we look at an environment with high NPP – less seasonal, a lot of new
growth, a possible example could be a tropical rainforest – we see less of a
division between the foraging practices of men and women. Men will typically
focus on acquiring the more abundant and profitable foods since they constitute
a larger importance in the diet[21].
Therefore, in order to optimally acquire food, men’s practices will overlap
with that of women by gathering plant foods as opposed to hunting or fishing[22].
Thus, the sexual division of labor is much less.
On the other hand,
we see an opposite trend in environments with lower NPP – more seasonal, less
new growth, such as the arctic). Since women are still typically constrained to
gathering foods – of which there are few in these environments – men must
respond to this lack of gatherable foods by resorting instead to hunting and
fishing to be optimal providers[23].
In response to this necessity, a stark division of labor results with little to
no overlap in practices between men and women[24].
In these two
examples, we see the role that the environmental aspects of a space play in
reinforcing the trend that WFF knowledge is reserved to women. Since men
typically must respond to the NPP of a given place, they are required to either
join women in gathering or diverge from women and resort to hunting or fishing
in order to optimally acquire the most profitable foods available in their
environment. As discussed before, certain practices result certain
specializations which reinforce certain knowledges over those of other
specializations. Thus, men’s conformation of their practices to meet
environmental demands produces specializations in practices and knowledges that
either overlap with or diverge from that of women, who in any case are
typically restricted to foraging. This consequently affects the trend that WFF
knowledge is reserved to women, because this knowledge can be more evenly
distributed among the sexes in environments – like those with high NPP – where
men optimize their food acquisitions by focusing on foraged foods.
Final Remarks and Conclusion
To review what we
have seen in this week’s discussion on WFF knowledge, the environmental and
social make-ups of different sites result in human adaptions of foraging
practices via sexual divisions of labor. As evident in many ethnobotanical
studies, there is an overwhelming trend that WFF knowledge is reserved to
women, since foraging falls into the domain of domestic duties of which women
often take responsibility. This is largely the case because women usually must
curb their food acquisition to methods that do not conflict with reproduction
and child care. As a result, they are largely confined to foraging rather than
hunting and fishing; although this is not always the case, as we have seen. Men,
on the other hand, must adapt their food acquisition to encompass these other
methods to supplement and compliment the foods that their female partners
provide. This benefits the household’s diet, but may also advertise the male’s
aptitudes as a provider to potential mates since hunted and fished foods are
energy dense and can often be shared with the community outside the home. This
divergence of practices results in a divergence of specializations – reinforced
with the mastering of specific tools – which equally produce a divergence of
knowledges between genders where women become authorities of WFF knowledge. This
stresses the importance of cooperation among men and women to exercise their
respective knowledges in order to be the most efficient providers so that they
– and their households – benefit from the acquisition and sharing of different
foods. Thus, this sexual division of labor and consequent division of knowledge
serves a function of efficiency to produce maximum results in food acquisition
via the cooperation of the sexes.
However, the study
on the human sexual division of foraging labor reminds us that environmental
aspects of a locale affect the distribution of WFF knowledge as much as the
social ones. Places with high NPP experience an overlap in practices among men
and women, resulting in a more even distribution of WFF knowledge. However,
places with low NPP force a starker sexual division of labor where WFF
knowledge is reserved to women since men must resort more to hunting and
fishing. Thus, spatial aspects concerning the environment play a particular
role in how WFF knowledge is distributed among the sexes and whether or not the
trend that it is reserved to women is reinforced.
But in the
majority of cases, especially the ethnobotanical studies that Sites of Forage
has examined so far, WFF knowledge is overwhelmingly women’s domain with very
few exceptions[25].
Yet although this has been remarked upon in multiple surveys, many
ethnobotanists express an overall lack of documented WFF knowledge, which they
attribute to its association with women. One study criticizes the methodology
of a large body of incoherent ethnobotanical data because “most of the accounts
were written by men, and so they potentially over-emphasize male activities and
downplay female activities”[26].
The study consequently manipulates this data by giving female roles larger
importance, upon which the data makes more analytical sense[27].
Likewise, a
Moroccan study attests to gaps in the current scientific documentation of ethnobotany
in the country because research is most often conducted by men, but WFF are a
woman’s domain[28].
The authors explain that research “has likely been historically limited by the
strong social stigma some people ascribe to [WFF], a gender gap between trained
botanists who are mainly male and the women who hold the knowledge”[29]. With
this remark, we see how social stigmas found in certain sites have made their
way along the grape vine to affect ethnobotany as a whole. As the Moroccan
survey warn us, stigmas between male researchers and the female holders of
ethnobotanical knowledge lead to the oversight of a huge body of knowledge
comprising ethnobotany. Therefore, this study and many others like it promote
the importance of consulting women to produce legitimate and fruitful
contributions to ethnobotanical knowledge. Thus, we see the important role that
the sexes play in WFF knowledge systems at the local level, but also in the
entire field of ethnobotany.
______________________________________________________________________________
Sites of Forage Recipe:
Pheasant with Elderberry Reduction and Hazelnuts
In this recipe,
the gaminess of the pheasant is cut just enough by a lemony marinade and the
fruity elderberry reduction from the “Foraging” section of this post. I found
that hazelnuts compliment the flavor of the reduction really nicely in addition
to adding a bit of texture to the dish. I bought a whole, frozen pheasant and
butchered it myself into four pieces – two legs and two breasts. There are many
great tutorials on Youtube that demonstrate how to butcher a chicken – the same
method can be applied to all birds – if you are unfamiliar with how to do so.
As mentioned
before, the pheasant can easily be swapped out with chicken or even other game
birds like grouse or quail. If that’s the case, you will have to adjust cooking
time to accommodate for different sized birds. It’s also important to mention
that pheasant goes from raw to over-cook very quickly. So, keep an eye on it in
the pan and be careful not to dry it out.
Ingredients:
1 pheasant, cut into 4 pieces (2 breasts, 2 legs)
20 ml chicken stock
15 ml elderberry reduction
2 tsp lemon juice
1 handful hazelnuts, toasted and crushed
1 tsp thyme, fresh, finely chopped
For the Marinade:
2 Tbsp thyme, fresh, roughly chopped
1 lemon, zested and juiced
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
3 Tbsp olive oil
Method:
Begin by making
the marinade. In a mortar and pestle, grind the thyme, lemon zest, salt, and
pepper into a fine mixture. Add lemon juice and olive oil and grind/stir to
dissolve the salt in the mixture. Coat the pheasant pieces with the marinade in
a leak-proof dish, cover with plastic wrap and leave to marinade ideally
overnight in the fridge.
When ready to
cook, heat a pan over medium high heat. When the pan is hot, add a splash of
oil and then the pheasant pieces. Cook thoroughly on both sides until seared and
just cooked through – about 4-5 minutes per side, depending on the size of the
pieces. Remove pheasant pieces to a plate and let rest. Crank the heat to high
and add the chicken stock and elderberry reduction to deglaze, scraping the
bottom of the pan to release the caramelized bits. Cook the mixture over high
heat, stirring occasionally, until reduced by half to obtain a thicker, saucier
consistency – about 5 minutes. Once reduced, take off the heat, add the lemon juice
and pour over the cooked pheasant pieces. Top with the hazelnuts and fresh
thyme before serving.
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Sources
Bulbeck, David.
"The Transition from Foraging to Farming in Prehistory and
‘Ethnography’." World Archaeology 45,
no. 4 (2013): 557-73.
Geng,
Yanfei, Yu Zhang, Sailesh Ranjitkar, Huyin Huai, and Yuhua Wang.
"Traditional Knowledge and Its Transmission of Wild Edibles Used by the
Naxi in Baidi Village, Northwest Yunnan Province." Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 12 (February 05 2016):
10.
Kaliszewska,
Iwona, and Iwona Kolodziejska-Degorska. "The Social Context of Wild Leafy
Vegetables Uses in Shiri, Daghestan." Journal
of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 11 (August 11 2015)
Marlowe,
Frank W. "Hunting and Gathering: The Human Sexual Division of Foraging
Labor." Cross-Cultural Research 41,
no. 2 (2007): 170-95.
Powell,
Bronwen, Abderrahim Ouarghidi, Timothy Johns, Mohamed Ibn Tattou, and Pablo
Eyzaguirre. "Wild Leafy Vegetable Use and Knowledge across Multiple Sites
in Morocco: A Case Study for Transmission of Local Knowledge?". Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 10:34
(2014).
Signorini,
Maria Adele, Maddalena Piredda, and Piero Bruschi. "Plants and Traditional
Knowledge: An Ethnobotanical Investigation on Monte Ortobene (Nuoro, Sardinia)."
Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
5 (Feb 10 2009).
[1]
The following sources all embody this trend or directly discuss it:
Iwona Kaliszewska and Iwona Kolodziejska-Degorska, "The Social
Context of Wild Leafy Vegetables Uses in Shiri, Daghestan," Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
11 (2015).
Maria Adele Signorini, Maddalena Piredda, and Piero Bruschi, "Plants
and Traditional Knowledge: An Ethnobotanical Investigation on Monte Ortobene
(Nuoro, Sardinia)," ibid.5 (2009).
Bronwen Powell et al., "Wild Leafy Vegetable Use and Knowledge across
Multiple Sites in Morocco: A Case Study for Transmission of Local
Knowledge?," ibid.10:34 (2014).
David Bulbeck, "The Transition from Foraging to Farming in Prehistory
and ‘Ethnography’," World
Archaeology 45, no. 4 (2013).
[2] Signorini, Piredda, and Bruschi.
[3]
Ibid.
[4] Frank W. Marlowe, "Hunting and Gathering: The Human Sexual Division
of Foraging Labor," Cross-Cultural
Research 41, no. 2 (2007).
[5]
Ibid.
[6]
Ibid.
[7]
Ibid.
[8]
Ibid.
[9]
Ibid.
[10]
Ibid.
[11]
Ibid.
[12]
Ibid.
[13]
Ibid.
[14]
Ibid.
[15]
Ibid.
[16]
Ibid.
[17]
Ibid.
[18]
Ibid.
[19]
Ibid.
[20]
Ibid.
[21]
Ibid.
[22]
Ibid.
[23]
Ibid.
[24]
Ibid.
[25]
The following source is the only example from Sites of Forage’s selection that records no difference in WFF
knowledge among men and women:
Yanfei Geng et al., "Traditional Knowledge and Its Transmission of
Wild Edibles Used by the Naxi in Baidi Village, Northwest Yunnan
Province," Journal of Ethnobiology
and Ethnomedicine 12 (2016).
[26] Bulbeck.
[27]
For more information on the study’s methods to fill in gaps and correct certain
fallacies in a large body of ethnographic data, see Bulbeck.
[28] Powell et al.
[29]
Ibid.
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