NR - Period Food (was Soup Kitchen)
Lee McGoodwin
etienett at yahoo.com
Mon Sep 11 22:45:14 PDT 2000
I have eaten Baric's food both at SCA feasts and
mundanely at his home. I would be willing to act as a
guinney pig for his experiments. He does good!!!!
I have helped Baroness Mairin with feasts on many
occasions--from planning to serving. I think her
cooking philosophy is much like Bear's. It would be
nice if more SCA cooks developed a similar attitude.
I can't say that every period recipe I've tried
has been to my liking, but I always try them. Often,
it is only a flavor(s) I'm not accostom too, and
cannot otherwise fault the cook.
Lady Etienett
> I think it is a mistake to create a feast to the
> Lowest Common Denominator.
> Different people have different tastes and I think
> the key to a great feast
> is to provide a variety and surfeit of food, that no
> one will leave the
> table starving, even if they choose to pass on a
> number of the dishes.
> Success to me is a room full of stuffed lords and
> ladies and at least a
> break even on the expenses.
>
> My view is period food is appealing if properly
> prepared, and that the
> adventuresome souls of the SCA deserve as fine a
> fare as I can produce for a
> reasonable price. Yes, there are dishes that I'm
> certain only the most
> venturesome would touch, but there are so many
> appealing period dishes, that
> there is no reason to use the outre recipes, much
> less modern recipes.
>
> For example, I will be preparing the Protectorate
> Feast this year. My menu
> consists of period Tudor, Elizabethan, and Jacobean
> recipes from original
> sources (with one or two of questionable origin),
> interpreted and adapted by
> me for this feast. A feaster may not like some of
> the individual dishes,
> but overall they should enjoy the feast if I prepare
> the dishes properly.
> For myself, I've had modern equivalents of every
> dish in the menu and that
> the differences should be less than that of eating
> Chinese food.
>
> The menu I am planning is:
>
> Manchet
> Jumbals
>
> First Course
>
> Whiting with Apple and Wine Sauce
> Chicken with Orange Sauce
> Sweet Spinach Tart
> Sweet Potatoes
>
> Second Course
>
> Roast Beef
> Rice Pudding
> Boyled Peascods (although I may have to make do with
> frozen peas)
>
> Entremet
>
> Shrewsbury Cakes
>
>
> I expect the whiting and the spinach tart to be the
> least favored dishes,
> but I may be surprised. I do not recommend this
> feast to anyone who cannot
> stand the Four Horsemen of Elizabethan Cooking;
> cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and
> sugar.
>
> When I started, I did a lot of "perioid" and ethnic
> recipes. With each
> successive feast, I have worked at making my recipes
> more period, more
> thematic, and more locale and time specific. I see
> no reason to limit
> myself or the people who attend my feasts a small
> subset of the recipes
> which are available. There are times I succeed and
> times I fail to achieve
> my goals, but over 25 years in the SCA, I've had
> very few people complain
> that I did not feed them well.
>
> In my opinion, the biggest enemy of "period" food in
> the SCA is the cook who
> tries to cover up bad cooking with the excuse "it's
> period." I've had
> enough bad feasts in the SCA to know that there are
> quite a few people who
> cannot cook for large groups. Bad cooking is bad
> cooking. Modern food,
> ethnic food, period food, whatever we serve as a
> feast, every cook should go
> all out to make their feast the best meal the SCA
> has ever seen and when we
> fail we shouldn't hide behind excuses.
>
> How the hell did I wind up in Hyde Park on a
> soapbox, setting myself up for
> one helluva fall if I don't pull off the next feast?
> Lordy, lordy!
>
> If you get to Protectorate, Gio, swing by the
> kitchen and we'll kick around
> cooking philosophy.
>
> Bon Chance
>
> Bear
>
>
>
> > 2. Consider the audience when planning a menu.
> If my local
> > group has
> > given me money to spend on the food for thier
> event, you can
> > be sure that
> > every dish I make will be great tasting and appeal
> to as many
> > of the people
> > buying the feast as I can. If I can slip in
> period recipes, I will,
> > however, I will not sacrifice "appealing to as
> many people
> > buying the feast
> > as I can" just to do a documented recipe. If I
> have done a
> > fabulous well
> > documented feast, but most people only ate half of
> the dishes
> > prepared, I
> > think I would have failed and let down my barony.
> However,
> > if I have a
> > small private feast, I can better tailor my
> guestlist and the
> > menu for
> > those who truely appreciate the finer distinctions
> of period
> > food and I
> > would go all out.
> >
> > This doesn't mean that I would plan a "Luby's"
> feast (ham and
> > pineapple,
> > green bean cassarole, cornbread, pinto
> beans....your general "Lou-Ann
> > Platter"). But, I would try to stick to "less
> modern"
> > preperations and the
> > more familiar and easily accessible of period
> recipes.
> >
> > Gio...who really needs to cook more.
> >
> >
>
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No light shines on the mind protected
No light shines on the fangs neglected
Run with the wolfpack. (song lyrics)
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