THE NOBLE SAVAGES' NOBLE FRUIT (via Glen Dryfoos):

The Zing Starts Here (DAVID LEITE, 11/12/08, NY Times)

[C]ranberries are the neglected stepchild of the season.

But if guests at the holiday table knew what went into growing the perfect scarlet berry, and if cooks understood the challenges of working with a fruit so sour it makes your jaw sing, the humble cranberry might just be looked upon as the noble autumnal fruit it is, right up there with quince, pomegranate and persimmon.

Considered one of three commercially important fruits native to North America and unknown to European settlers (the others are blueberries and Concord grapes), cranberries were used by Native Americans as food, dye and medicine long before they were co-opted by Thanksgiving advocates.

“No one knows for sure what the Pilgrims ate at that first meal,” said Roseann DeGrenier, who owns the Willows Cranberries farms here and in Plymouth, Mass., as she walked along one of her bogs. “But cranberries were definitely all around them.”