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LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON
The mouth-watering smell of moose meat prepared in seven different ways drifted through the halls of Bompas Elementary School on Oct. 28. The occasion was the school's second annual school-wide moose feast.

Sky Lennie serves the moose stew that Class 6 made for Bompas Elementary School's moose feast. Parents and community members were invited to the feast on Oct. 28. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photo

The school's gym quickly filled up with students, parents and community members who arrived to partake in the lunch-hour event. The feast was the culmination of a month focused on moose.

Every month the Dene Kede curriculum has a different theme and October's theme was moose, said Nancy Noseworthy, the school's principal.

Throughout the month, the animal was incorporated into each class's lessons. Some of the results included moose-themed artwork, letters of thanks to moose and poems about moose.

The work was displayed on the walls of the gym during the feast. The feast itself was first organized with the students in mind.

"We wanted to celebrate children learning," she said.

The staff also wanted to invite the parents into the school and food is a good way to do that, said Noseworthy.

In the days leading up to the feast, all of the students helped prepare the dishes that would be served using moose meat that Liidlii Kue First Nation donated.

With lots of help from the school's support staff, each class made its own dish.

Isaac Isaiah helped make Class 6's moose stew. Isaiah's contribution was chopping up lots of onions and carrots.

The stew's other ingredients included peas, corn and turnip.

Isaiah and Brent Villeneuve sat at a table together trying all of the dishes. Isaiah said the stew was his favourite.

"It's really good," he said. "I feel like I want to make some moose meat at my house so I can eat it all."

Villeneuve said the moose stroganoff made by one of the other classes was his preferred dish.

"It's really, really good," he said.

Villeneuve said he liked the feast because he likes tasting new things and learning about different ways of cooking moose meat.

At another table, Elizabeth Hardisty was sitting with her great-grandsons.

Hardisty commended the school's students on their cooking.

"It's a great job they did," she said.

Hardisty said there was a good variety of dishes. She tried the moose stew, chili and dry jerky.

Class 5 students, including Teagan Zoe-Hardisty, made the chili. Zoe-Hardisty helped by cutting moose meat into little pieces and chopping up onions. It doesn't get much better than moose meat, he said.

"It tastes perfect."

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