Earth Rock Oven 2016

For today's post I'm looking back again at one of the events that was part of my Fall 2016 Archaeology course: an earth rock oven cookout. I chose the site a few weeks before the event, making sure we'd have enough soil depth to build a fire and cover our food with earth. The perfect spot was upland from the creek since the soil was soft and deep enough (but not wet) and so we would have water to extinguish the ovens. A few days prior, we collected flat limestone rocks and firewood and decided who would bring what food. We decided on corn and sweet potatoes to cook in the ovens and of course marshmallows and hot dogs to cook over the fire while the stones heated! The cookout lasted from early morning through the afternoon since we were using smaller ovens, less food, and we wanted a quicker cooking time overall.

Oven 1: Diana and Penny growing the fire over rocks

Jenn brought popcorn!

Oven 1: Brewing some Navajo tea on the coals, getting ready to move
the charcoal out of the way of the heated rocks

Oven 2: Getting the fire going

Soaking corn in the husk and removing silks so it will steam in
 the oven without burning and be easier to eat

Oven 2: I'm moving the charcoal and rocks out of the way

Oven 1: Soaked corn husks are placed on the hot rocks

Our sweet potatoes were wrapped in foil, then covered with more husks.
 Corn was added in the husk without foil

We covered the food with more soaked husks, they are already steaming

John and Theresa covering the rocks and food with earth.
The last stage of cooking is to cover up the ovens with earth and wait.

We had too much fun!

This is my new favorite way to cook corn! It was sweet and smoky and perfect!

Shaun cooked steak over the fire

Melinda made a food bundle containing a Navajo blue corn dish

Angie found a projectile point in our oven backdirt!

The sweet potatoes were delicious