Crabapples in Prairie Food History

Crabapples don’t get much credit in Canadian culinary history. They grow on schoolyard edges and old farm shelterbelts, often dismissed as ornamental or too sour to bother with. Yet for more than a century, these hardy little fruits were a staple of prairie kitchens—and long before settlers planted their first orchards, Indigenous communities were already incorporating crabapples into their seasonal diets. What we see as a decorative afterthought once anchored food traditions across the Prairies