It is believed to have been an invention of indigenous peoples in what is now known as New England, though English soldier and explorer Jonathan Carver attributed it to numerous tribes of eastern North America:One dish however, which answers nearly the same purpose as bread, is in use among the Ottagaumies, the Saukies, and the more eastern nations, where Indian corn grows, which is not only much esteemed by them, but it is reckoned extremely palatable by all the Europeans who enter their dominions.

This is composed of their unripe corn as before described, and beans in the same state, boiled together with bears flesh, the fat of which moistens the pulse, and renders it beyond comparison delicious.

Composed of ingredients unknown in Europe at the time, it gradually became a standard meal in the cuisine of New England[8][9] and is a traditional dish of many Thanksgiving celebrations in the region,[10] as well as in Pennsylvania and other states.

[citation needed] After the abolition of slavery in the United States, freed slaves in the American South returned to Africa and introduced the dish to the region.

Henry Ward Beecher's recipe, published in an 1846 issue of Western Farmer and Gardner, adds salt pork, which he says is "an essential part of the affair.