LaHoma Roberts is Mississippi Choctaw and Oklahoma Choctaw. LaHoma works at Absentee Shawnee and shared the ways she incorporates vegetables into her meals.
Q: What are some vegetables used in Choctaw cooking?
A: We usually cook hominy, usually that’s the main course that we serve for all of our birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, funerals and it’s cooked with chicken. A lot of cornbread, biscuits that are served with it. That is the main course. As far as vegetables, I guess the corn of it.
Q: What is your favorite way to incorporate beans and squash into a recipe?
A: I love squash, I like to sauté it or bread it and fry it or sometimes I put it in my soups.
Q: When you make it into a soup is it just vegetables or some type of protein?
A: I usually put chicken, ground beef, or stew meat in it when I make it and corn soup I cook it a lot for the holidays. Usually, when I make regular soup I use corn, green beans, cauliflower, broccoli, onions.
Q: What about beans? Do you use beans often?
A: When I make my taco soup I use beans; black beans, navy beans and pinto beans.
Q: Do you put them all in one?
A: One