Nocake

If their imperious occaſions cauſe them to travell, the beſt of their victuals for their journey is Nocake, (as they call it) which is nothing but Indian Corne parched in the hot aſhes; the aſhes being ſifted from it, it is afterwards beaten to powder, and put into a long leatherne bag, truſſed at their backe like a knapſacke; out of which they take thrice three ſpoonefulls a day, dividing it into three meales.

A ſmall pouch of parched corn, ground or rather pounded into meal, and called Nuichicke, which is well enough tranſlated Nocake, would ſupport them ſeveral days in their travelling, when they could get no other proviſions; [...]

Nookhick or nokehick, the Indian name of the meal of parched corn, was pronounced nocake, by the English, who sometimes hired Indian women to prepare it for them. Winthrop says the parched corn was "turned almost inside outward, and was white and floury." It must have resembled our parched popcorn.

The Indians had not the art of making bread. Their boiled their corn [...] or they ate the parched kernels whole; or with a stone pestle and a wooden mortar they broke them up into meal, which, moistened with water into a paste, they called nookhik.¹ [Footnote 1: Nookhik, meal, (Eliot's Indian Bible,) was corrupted by the English into nocake.]

This preparation of corn was called nocake or nookick. [...] It was held to be the most nourishing food known, and in the smallest and most condensed form.

The Puritans raised corn (or maize) which they got from the Indians; and they soon learned the virtues of "nocake"—a name derived from the Indian of noohkik. Nocake was made of selected Indian corn, parched in hot ashes, then well sifted and thoroughly pulverized. It was mixed with cold water and drunk. The early Virginians knew it as "rockahomonie." Nocake was the rudiment with which the New England folk began the study of foods prepared from Indian corn.

[pages 5–6] In connection with the mortar and pestle, our attention is directed towards the preparation of nocake (nókek‘, corn parched and pounded) and the realization of its unsurpassed tastiness and value as a staple food. [...] [page 7] One informant confessed, of his own accord, his occasional craving for nocake, and remarked upon the individual satisfaction derived from preparing and eating it. For making nocake, Indian or "native" corn of the yellow variety is preferred.

It was some time before the white man learned the red man's secret—Nocake. Undoubtedly the first American food concentrate was Nocake. Simple to prepare, easy to carry, always dependable, it was his dependence in the forests, on the trails, even on the warpath.