H16.2916

Cooking stick "Stick made of oak." (Bruce Bernstein, 7/91) "Apparently tied with commercial cordage. Tulare Indian (as originally catalogued) usually known as Yokuts." (Craig Bates, 10/91) Stone for cooking-baskets. From the History Information Station: "Object: Cooking stone (16.571) collected among the Pomo; oak cooking stick (16.2916) collected among the Yokuts. Both date to the late 19th or early 20th century. They were acquired by C.P. Wilcomb, founding curator of the Oalkland Public Museum, circa 1910. History: California Indian women did almost all of their cooking in baskets. Since baskets cannot be placed directly on a fire, food such as acorn mush was cooked by adding hot rocks to it. A good cooking rock is of a material that does not crack or explode when heated, such as soapstone or vesicular basalt. It is tested by heatting in a fire and, if found, suitable, carefully pecked and ground into the desired shape. Red-hot cooking stones are lifted from the fire, dipped in water to clean away ash, and lowered into the mush using the cooking stick. The mush and the rocks are stirred vigorously to ensure even cooking and that the basket does not burn. Cool rocks are replaced by hot ones until mush begins to boil."

Used: food preparation