SC - "Period" is not the enemy of "fun" (long, it's a slow day)
Jeanne Stapleton
jstaplet at adm.law.du.edu
Fri Jun 6 09:51:07 PDT 1997
Hi Cooks:
I finally have something approaching a moment to address this issue.
It's been observed by more articulate minds than I that
"authenticity" and "fun" are often made antithetical in the SCA.
There's no need for them to be.
I'm on this list, personally, because I've been cooking a long time,
including stints at a catering service and as head cook for SCA
feasts, and I enjoy it. Even were I not in the SCA, I would still
cook for fun and for friends; I would still experiment with learning
new cuisines.
I personally find redaction to be a stimulating exercise that
stretches muscles. Do I prepare totally period foods for camps that
I cook for? Not generally; but I try to observe the "perioid" idea
of not bringing blatantly out of period ingredients or foods, and I
do throw at least one redaction into every meal where I can. I find
that it helps me to get into the spirit of events more--"persona", if
you will, although I've generally lived in low-impact persona areas.
I've seen the discussion of whether we can truly "create" perioid
type dishes even if we have done lots of redactions, have worked to
learn more period techniques, and have a sound idea of general
cooking techniques. I'm afraid I do come down on the side of "you
can do it in a period style provided you use the period techniques
and ingredients". Sorry, "only if it's in a manuscript" hardliners.
:-)
But I do agree that if it's served in a feast, and things aren't
starred "non-period", people assume they're being served medieval
food. After all, isn't that what cooking guilds are for?
What stymies me, personally, is the notion that one "cannot" go for
"an entire weekend!" without chocolate. Or potatoes. Or something
that the person can and does get at home, three meals a day plus
snacks, the other five days of the week. This strikes me as the
"spoilt brat" syndrome. Lest anyone think I'm being hard, I'm
equally mystified by travellers abroad who insist on eating at
McDonald's the whole time (although Mickey D's in Australia, New
Zealand and France all had very different things than America--it
*was* like eating in another land anyway!).
I'd like to suggest, on feast menus, that perhaps whoever prepares
them mark items with a couple of symbols: one for vegetarian dishes
(I live in a high vegetarian per capita zone) and one for non-period
items (or period items, if you want to go the other way). That
doesn't stop people from eating whatever appeals to them, but at
least they'll learn from what is period and still enjoy what isn't
(but they won't go home and tell their friends, "Corn on the cob *is*
period!).
On a tangent about sources: something that has absolutely fried me
has been judges who won't accept *archeological data* as a primary
source (only manuscripts written by period authors). Hello! Does
the fundamental flaw in logic hit anyone else squarely between the
eyes?
Countess Berengaria de Montfort de Carcassonne, OP
Barony of Caerthe
Kingdom of the Outlands
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