Image of desert and produce

DESTINY ALEXANDER / NEXTGENRADIO

Braden Harper speaks with Tricia Fields Alexander, owner of Autumn Star Catering, which serves traditional Native American foods across the country. Serving foods at a variety of Native community gatherings, Alexander feels a close connection with her community and her family through cooking traditional recipes.

Tricia Fields Alexander serves traditional Native foods across Indian Country

by | Nov 18, 2022

Listen To The Story

by Braden Harper | Next Generation Radio, Native American Journalists Association | November 2022

Click here for audio transcript
A hog fry is a traditional way of cooking for several tribes.

It’s a community event where a hog is butchered for a special occasion, whether it’s a celebration, a funeral, or just a celebratory time. 

Tricia Fields, Alexander [Speaking Mvskoke Language] My name is Tricia Fields Alexander, and I am of the Tiger Clan or Panther clan from my mother’s side. I am enrolled in Muskogee Creek. My ceremonial ground is Pole Cat or Kellyville.

I live in Glenpool, Oklahoma, and I own Autumn Star Catering, where I specialize in traditional Native foods. 

I had a need for money while still being able to be a stay-at-home mother to my children. 

There’s all kinds of foods that are traditional blue cornbread, blue corn cookies, blue corn drinks.  Fried corn. Roasted corn, beans and dumplings, squash and watermelon, different salads. People don’t often think of salads, but of course, you know, we don’t always have the luxury of having meat, so we eat a lot of vegetables. 

The diet of the Native American people has changed since contact in a detrimental way in that we ate for a long time as survival and we were not able to be selective of what we ate. We ate what we were lucky to be given because we were forced into forts and reservations. So we also lost a lot of our traditional ways of life, such as gardening, foraging. 

Native people experience food insecurity in several ways. One, with most of our people living in or along poverty line. Many of our people rely on commodities or the USDA to have food or they qualify and benefit from SNAP food benefits. 

Sometimes a lot of people live in remote areas where there’s not a store nearby, or there’s only gas stations nearby. 

Hunting is also a tribal sovereignty and also a cultural practice in itself, to know where to hunt, to know how to hunt, to know what to hunt.

My dad is a hunter and I’m very proud of him and I’m very thankful to be his daughter and that he has that knowledge. We have land that he goes out and hunts on that my uncles have all hunted with him. His friends have hunted with him. I have, my son has, my cousins. And that he has that knowledge and the patience to go out and to know what to do with the animal afterward. 

There’s venison, like venison roast, back strap. You can use the back strap. That’s the best part of it. A lot of everybody has heard about back strap because of reservation dogs, but it is the best part of it. I mean, you can make the most flavorful, softest roast out of that. 

What makes me so passionate about serving the traditional foods that I serve is it brings me closer to the community that I live in and that I serve. It makes me feel good to bring happiness to other people that eat my food. It brings me great joy to feel connected to my past from the people that taught me how to cook or that cooked for me.

Traditional Native American recipes are a symbol of resilience, surviving generations of removal, genocide, and cultural assimilation. These foods are still found today and serve a deeply meaningful purpose within Native American community gatherings, like hog fries. This is where the community comes together to eat and be in community with one another. Tricia Fields Alexander is a Native American business owner and an enrolled member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She serves traditional foods that include cornbread, grape dumplings and various meat roasts.

Tricia Fields Alexander scoops beans onto a woman’s plate.
Fresh fry bread in a silver tray.
Grape dumplings are ladled into a cup.
People line up for food at the hog fry.

Tricia Fields Alexander serves grape dumplings, fry bread and beans at a hog fry in Catoosa, Okla., Nov. 12, 2022. Her traditional Native recipes have been passed down through generations.

BRADEN HARPER / NEXTGENRADIO

Alexander owns Autumn Star Catering in Glenpool, Oklahoma, which caters traditional Native American foods many Indigenous Oklahomans know like wild onions, backstrap, venison and grape dumplings. The business is thriving, serving Native and non-Native communities across the state. Originally it was a way for Alexander to earn extra income to support her family.

“It’s helped me with a lot of things. It helped me raise my kids, I never had to put my kids in daycare,” Alexander said. “I was able to continue with school and supplement my income.”

As they grew up, Alexander’s children found ways to help serve in the family business. Most recently, Alexander was seen serving traditional foods with her youngest daughter, Katie, at a hog fry in Catoosa for the Cherokee Nation. Hundreds of people ate plates of food prepared by her.

A mother and daughter in matching black aprons smile for the camera.

Katie Alexander and her mom, Tricia Fields Alexander, served traditional foods as Autumn Star Catering, Catoosa, Okla., Nov. 12, 2022. “What inspired me to start my own catering business is I had a need for money while still being able to be a stay-at-home mother to my children,” Alexander said.

BRADEN HARPER / NEXTGENRADIO

Autumn Star Catering is part of a larger movement of Indigenous chefs and businesses that are bringing awareness to getting back to healthier Native foods that pre-date European contact. Alexander, along with Nico Albert, a Cherokee chef in Tulsa, Sean Sherman, founder and CEO of the Sioux Chef in Minnesota and Tocabe restaurant in Colorado, are all part of a wave of Indigenous chefs that are fighting food insecurity.

We were given government rations and had to make do with what was left over,” Alexander said. “My understanding from my ancestors of stories that were passed down is that they were given rations, but that the soldiers or, you know, the higher ranking soldiers would pick over what was brought in that was supposed to be for the Native people. They would pick over and we would get what was left.”

A man and woman cook meat at the hog fry.

Hog fries involve cooking large pots of meat and potatoes outdoors. Rocky Carroll closely watches the meat and potatoes as they fry, Catoosa, Okla., Nov. 12, 2022.

BRADEN HARPER / NEXTGENRADIO

Today, Native communities continue to struggle with food insecurity from the COVID-19 pandemic and high inflation prices. In a survey conducted by the Food Research and Action Center, it reports half of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives surveyed experienced food insecurity during the pandemic.

Alexander is busy catering many events across the state. She can be seen at her events she hosts like the Native American Christmas Market, the Indian Sweetheart Market, the Tulsa Indian Arts Festival and the Restore Harmony Powwow. She frequently caters Muscogee (Creek) and Cherokee Nation gatherings, as well as private celebrations across the state of Oklahoma.

Cooking and hunting are two traditions that only work in coordination with one another. Hunting is a sacred tradition and a sovereign right. Alexander comes from a family of hunters. Her father and uncle are all hunters.

“Hunting is a tribal sovereignty and also a cultural practice in itself, to know where to hunt, to know how to hunt, to know what to hunt, to know what to do with that animal once you’ve killed it, because you are obligated and you have a responsibility to care for that animal after you’ve killed it,” Alexander said.

It makes me feel good to bring happiness to other people that eat my food. It connects me with the past. It connects me to the people that taught me how to cook those foods.

A close up of a wood fire crackling.
Fried hog meat cooks in a large metal pot.

Hog fries involve cooking large pots of meat and potatoes outdoors, like at this fry in Catoosa, Okla., Nov. 12, 2022.

BRADEN HARPER / NEXTGENRADIO

She went on to describe the many ways meat can be used from an animal, such as venison, chili, and backstrap, a cut of meat known for its tender texture. Backstrap was popularized by Hulu’s original series Reservation Dogs.

It brings me closer to the community that I live in and that I serve,” Alexander said. “It makes me feel good to bring happiness to other people that eat my food. It connects me with the past. It connects me to the people that taught me how to cook those foods.”

Alexander’s culinary talents have taken her all the way to Washington D.C., serving foods at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian.

One of the most requested foods that Alexander serves is the Indian taco, a dish that involves fry bread topped with meat, veggies and cheese. It’s a dish she has had conflicted feelings about serving in the past. It is a survival food, not a traditional one.

It was just kind of an invented food for us and something that we had to have to adapt to be able to eat and survive,” Alexander said.

A group of people eat and talk

Community members gather and chat over traditional foods at the hog fry, Catoosa, Okla., Nov. 12, 2022. Alexander says the food reminds her of growing up around her family members.

BRADEN HARPER / NEXTGENRADIO