dat was not in cultivation. He had de woods full
of hogs and cows and he owned seven or eight grown slaves and several
children. I remember Uncle Shed, Uncle Lige, Aunt Chaney, Aunt Lizzie,
and Aunt Susy just as well as if it was yesterday. Master Holmes and
Miss Betsy was both half-breed Choctaw Indians. Dey had both been away
to school somewhere in de states and was well educated. Dey had two
children but dey died when dey was little. Another little girl was
born to dem after de War and she lived to be a grown woman.

Dey sure was fine young folks and provided well for us. He allus had a
smokehouse full of meat, lard, sausage, dried beans, peas, corn,
potatoes, turnips and collards banked up for winter. He had plenty of
milk and butter for all of us, too.

Master Holmes allus say, "A hungry man caint work." And he allus saw
to it that we had lots to eat.

We cooked all sorts of Indian dishes: Tom-fuller, pashofa, hickory-nut
grot, Tom-budha, ash-cakes, and pound cakes besides vegetables and
meat dishes. Corn or corn meal was used in all de Indian dishes. We
made hominy out'n de whole grains. Tom-fuller was made from beaten
corn and tasted sort of like hominy.

We would take corn and beat it like in a wooden mortar wid a wooden
pestle. We would husk it by fanning it and we would den put it on to
cook in a big pot. While it was cooking we'd pick out a lot of
hickory-nuts, tie 'em up in a cloth and beat 'em a little and drop 'em
in and cook for a long time. We called dis dish hickory-nut grot. When
we made pashofa we beat de corn and cook for a little while and den we
add fresh pork and cook until de meat was done. Tom-budha was green
corn and fresh meat cooked together and seasoned wid tongue or
pepper-grass.

We cooked on de fire place wid de pots hanging over de fire on racks
and den we baked bread and cakes in a oven-skillet. We didn't use soda
and baking powder. We'd put salt in de meal and scald it wid boiling
water and make it into pones and bake it. We'd roll de ash cakes in
wet cabbage leaves and put 'em in de hot ashes and bake 'em. We cooked
potatoes, and roasting ears dat way also. We sweetened our cakes wid
molasses, and dey was plenty sweet too.

Dey was lots of possums and coons and squirrels and we nearly always
had some one of these to eat. We'd parboil de possum or coon and put
it in a pan and bake him wid potatoes 'round him. We used de broth to
baste him and for gravy. Hit sure was fine eating