What did it mean to be Moche? To experience Moche life? To eat “Moche”? The Moche people(s) constituted a highly differentiated and complex political organization that stretched up and down the northern Peruvian coast from AD 100-800. In this talk, I seek to enliven the past by unveiling the intimate actions of people. Using the remnants of meals, I investigate and shed light on the lived experiences of Moche individuals during the Late Moche period (AD 600-800) to reveal profound differences between the types of foods eaten in extraordinary (feast) and ordinary (daily meal) settings as well as status-based distinctions in food access. Furthermore, using the microscale approach, I am able to discern manifestations of stress and insecurity in the consumption practices of both the haves and the have-nots, suggesting that the people in my study were not immune to the effects of political, economic, and social turmoil brought on by several episodes of severe drought. By illustrating the powerful, interpretive potential of the “small things forgotten” to re-people the past, this research is applicable not only to those interested in the Moche, but also to scholarly communities invested in the study of food, households, social inequality, and identity.