Traditional Cowichan food knowledge passed down through generations

When Jared Qwustenuxun Williams was growing up he would often accompany his grandmother as she gathered and prepared food in their Cowichan territories, BC. He recalled her teaching him one of the Cowichan methods for curing salmon, which included harvesting ferns and alderwood, and hanging the fish to dry with a salt rub.

Years later, while attending culinary arts school, Williams realized how rare his food knowledge was. After graduating from cooking school and working in a handful of restaurants, Williams returned home. He understood then that his traditional food knowledge was also unique in his own community.

If I don't try to keep this information alive that it's gonna be lost really, really soon.- Jared Williams

Today, Williams is a chef and the elders kitchen manager and traditional foods program manager for the Cowichan Tribes. He incorporates Cowichan foods in the daily lunches that he prepares for his tribe's elders, and he oversees the cooking for large traditional foods events.

He credits his traditional food knowledge to his late grandmother.

"I wound up apprenticing under her without really realizing it," he said.  

It was common for elders to share important knowledge without being explicit about it, Williams explained.

A reality that is connected to the Canadian government's outlawing of Indigenous cultural practices, and the forced removal of Indigenous children from their families and into residential schools. In residential schools, Indigenous children were punished, often violently, for expressing their cultures.

"The people that were handing us this information were normally put in positions where they could not acknowledge this information. So, when they were handing it out I don't think they wanted us to acknowledge the importance, because they didn't want us to get hurt."

Often, important knowledge was shared in the way Williams received it from his grandmother, as something taught in passing. "It was always kind of less about holding on to information. And more about 'Hurry up now, come on, we got lots of work to do.'"

Williams is working to maintain and strengthen traditional food knowledge in his community, and in his family.

"I'm trying to encourage the rest of my relatives to hold on to the information that they have, because it's really valuable."

At home, Williams is teaching his two young boys what he learnt from his grandmother.

"If I don't try to keep this information alive that it's gonna be lost really, really soon."