Survival Food: North Woods Stories by a Menominee Cook

by Thomas Pecore Weso

An intimate and engaging Native food memoir

In these coming-of-age tales set on the Menominee Indian Reservation of the 1980s and 1990s, Thomas Pecore Weso explores the interrelated nature of meals and memories. As he puts it, “I cannot separate foods from the moments in my life when I first tasted them.” Weso’s stories recall the foods that influenced his youth in northern subsistence meals from hunted, fished, and gathered sources; the culinary traditions of the German, Polish, and Swedish settler descendants in the area; and the commodity foods distributed by the government—like canned pork, dried beans, and powdered eggs—that made up the bulk of his family’s pantry. His mom called this “survival food.”

These stories from the author’s teen and tween years—some serious, some laugh-out-loud funny—will take readers from Catholic schoolyards to Native foot trails to North Woods bowling alleys, while providing Weso’s perspective on the political currents of the era. The book also contains dozens of recipes, from turtle soup and gray squirrel stew to twice-baked cheesy potatoes. This follow-up to Weso’s Good A Menominee Indian Food Memoir is a hybrid of modern foodways, Indigenous history, and creative nonfiction from a singular storyteller.

Genres: Food

312 pages, Paperback

Published November 7, 2023

Reviews

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

. In twenty-one stories about life growing up Menominee, Weso attempts to redirect us toward our own family memories as well as encouraging us to forge new ones and pass them on to the next generation. Every story is an opportunity to share a life lesson or comment such as why Grandma encouraged them to drink coffee and tea, not alcohol. The stories are generous memories of tick bites, porcupine rescues, bear hunting, working on a road crew, felling trees, going to college, learning family lore such as the history behind Grandma and Grandpa’s house. All the way to the passing of Weso’s mother, Weso’s memories weave a loving and poignant, sometimes funny, and always thought-provoking tale of the importance of family and memory and how food is often the main ingredient of home.

[Shirleynature · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rest in Power, dear Tom!
From educator, writer, and artist Thomas Pecore Weso (1953-2023) -- a second memoir, after his earlier Good Seeds: A Menominee Indian Food Memoir. Both are fortifying storytelling for a reader's heart and mind.
These humourous, poignant, and savory stories and recipes are rooted in Menominee homelands known as Wisconsin with a few meanderings to Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas.
An excerpt linked from the author's website, tomweso.com:
“A Free Man: The Story of a Menominee Elder” from Survival Food: Stories of a North Woods Cook. March 13, 2023, Anthropology Magazine: Sapiens.
https://www.sapiens.org/culture/a-fre...

[Khanh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had never heard of this author before reading this book. I really enjoyed the stories about family and how food is so much more than preparing and then eating. It's about traditions, forging and sustaining connections, and making wonderful memories.
Overall a great book and one that makes me reflect on my own experiences with food and family.

[Kathryn Geimer-Chojnacki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting daily stories of life from young to older years, with connection to food involved in each story/chapter.

[Charlene Kizior · Rating 5 out of 5]

Living History

Wonderful to read stories and history of a Native American community I lived close to but did not get to know during my time of living in the area.

[Jim Gallen · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Survival Food" is author Thomas Pecore Weso's lighthearted, irreverent, accounts of his life as a Menominee both and off the reservation in northeastern Wisconsin, with a focus his avocation as a foodie. Each chapter ends with one or two recipes, often, but not always, related to the chapter's topic.

Readers are introduced to Weso's family, mostly his grandparents and Uncle Buddy, and life on the "rez." Some entries reveal history, such as his frequent return to the role of Catholic churches and schools in managing government programs and modifying cultural values. Although the author seems to adopt the common Indian claim that the Church tried to erase Indian culture, he does credit it with saving the Menomonee nation by getting its reservation established. Others are humorous, such as the rescue of a bear cub from the top of tree. The two get blended in the night early during World War II in which the Indians prepared their defense against an observed a group of "Japanese" assembling for an attack on the reservation. They turned out to be Minnesotans. It seems so absurd as to be funny, but it probably reflects fears that arose often across the fruited plain. I found Weso's references to Indians as opposed to Native Americans to be interesting.

My upper-middle class youth was obviously much different that Weso's in the poverty-stricken reservation, but he recited many experiences I found to be familiar. I remember coal being delivered to our house in East St. Louis and although I never partook, I remember signs offering 3.2% "near beer". I watched Popeye, the Three Stooges, Lawrence Welk, ate Oscar Mayer products, but we could get oleo margarine. My mother told me about wrestler "Gorgeous George. I commiserated with him as he wrote about his experience of settling his mother in a nursing home. My mother's home was better than Weso's description, but his comparison of nursing homes as putting the elderly in "emotional ice flows" is worth reflection by anyone in that situation. Toward the end, he justifies driving 90 miles per hour with the observation "In Missouri, you can drive fast." It is done but we do not recommend it.

Though not a foodie, I found "Survival Food" to be an enjoyable, entertaining read. I hope you do also.

I did receive a free copy of this book without an obligation to post a review.

[Cherie Zamel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting compilation of short stories and essays of a time and place in Wisconsin, different than how I grew up in Wisconsin. It was fun to read! (March Wisconsin Book Club pick) It does not flow like a novel, more like a collection of short stories. It would have been easier to read if they were organized more in chronological order. Took me longer to read - as I would only read one or two chapters at a time in a sitting.

A fav passage .. p274.. “One characteristic of the Menomoninees is that they are an egalitarian people. Gender roles tend to be fluid. Women can be warriors, and men can be great homemakers. About the only thing that divides male culture from female is that women are not allowed to handle drums”

It’s sad the Indian culture wasn’t the one to assimilate the Catholic white culture into theirs. Life would be so much better for women. I’m so sick of the Catholic misogynistic white culture. Clearly the Native Indians have had it right all along!!

I’m eager to learn more about the Native Indians that made Wisconsin their home centuries ago.

[Willful Wanderings · Rating 2 out of 5]

Physical Book - I did not enjoy thos Book at all. I found I had to force myself to pick it up and read it. It is a collection of short stories. I felt as though there is no rhyme or reason to how they are organized and often found myself confused as to what time period of his life he was talking about. Within each story there was alot of rambling and he often went off on tangents and I was unsure of the point he was trying to make. There was also alot of repetition. He mentioned that Hwy 47 was an old Indian trail and the preceded to remind us of this fact multiple times as he re mentioned the hwy in multiple other stories. Other things are repeated such as the fact thay he grew up in a old jail house. It was really repetitive to re state alot of these things when they were already mentioned earlier in the book.