Question: what american food helped supplement european peasants grains

title: Cuisine of the Thirteen Colonies
text: Food was eaten from wooden or pewter trenchers with two - tined forks , large spoons , and hunting knives . Dishware was not popular since it was easily breakable and tended to dull knives quickly . Unlike the Quakers and Puritans , feasting with an abundance of food and drink was never discouraged and practiced as often as was feasible . Generally , backcountry cuisine did not share the religious austerity of the North nor the refinement of the South and was therefore denigrated by outsiders . An apparent lack of fastidiousness in preparing the food provoked further criticism from many sources . The Anglican Woodmason characterized backcountry cooking as `` exceedingly filthy and most execrable '' . Others told of matrons washing their feet in the cook pot , that it was considered unlucky to wash a milk churn and that human hairs in butter were considered a sign of quality . These descriptions seem to be confirmed by an old saying attributed to Appalachian housewives : `` The mair ( more ) dirt the less hurt '' . Another expression of backcountry hardiness was the lack of appreciation of coffee and tea . Both were described as mere `` slops '' and were deemed appropriate only for those who were sick or unfit for labor .