SC - A question of concern...

[Erin Kenny]

My dear apprentice-sister Micaylah wrote:

> The first thing I would like to know is whether or not this is a common
> practise in other groups. We have in this Canton a box of spices and herbs,
> flours, other dried goods and various snippets and hoeys kept in a rough
> tote for kitchen stewards to use at their disposal for events and other
> requirements. It gets brought to light, oh probably, three times a year max.
> It lives in an old basement for the remainder of the time. I have a real,
> real problem with this. Am I the only one who does?

EWWWW!  Do we really do this?  I honestly had no idea (Siglinde did 
all of the acquisitions for our last feast).
 
<Good stuff about questionable quality and safety snipped>

> Since I am not the only one who uses this box I cannot just arbitrarily
> throw it out (although I did go through it the other day and throw out
> several unidentified bags of crap and other old sorry looking things).  What
> I would like to do is get a general opinion of the List, some guidance and
> perhaps some emphatic replys and present it at a meeting and TRY to dispose
> of this box and stop this practise.

TOSS THE BOX!  TOSS THE BOX!  As the next person who should receive 
it --- TOSS THE BOX!  Can you guess how I feel about this?  I'll back 
you up all the way at the next meeting we're both at.

> I know that when I sit down at a feast that I haven't done, I always wonder
> if "the scary box" was used in preparation of this meal, no matter how good
> it tastes I have this thought in the back of my mind. When I am cooking, my
> rule of thumb is to purchase exactly what I need, (yes I take measuring cups
> to the bulk food store) and if there is anything left I keep it. I don't
> feel like I am cheating the sca, nor do I feel like I am stealing. Usually
> there may be, say, a bottle of corn syrup, a cup of flour etc. when I am
> done. I have never had the problem of needing to do an emergency
> subsitution, and even if I did, I highly doubt it would be found in the "box".

I definitely agree with everything you said here.

> As well, another opinion on using these commodities, is that you may end up
> with a cakload of substandard foodstuffs because the baking powder you used
> got damp, or the raisins were just too old and tired, the cinnamon
> tasteless, etc. etc. etc.

Yup!  The second last time I tried to bake bread, it turned out the 
yeast was too old, and it just didn't rise.  What a waste of time, 
energy and ingredients.
 
As someone with several (non-fatal) allergies / sensitivities (both, 
but to different things -- let's not go through this discussion 
again) and who has friends with fatal allergies, I want to know 
EXACTLY what is in what I cook.  I don't care who's footing the bill, 
I won't be using the legacy box.

The cooking guild has a similar box.  It's not quite the same thing, 
though.  We use it monthly, and I can vouch personally for everything 
in the box (I better be able to -- it's in my kitchen).  It doesn't 
get stored in a basement, and I'm working on having everything that 
we actually keep in airtight containers with dates on them so that if 
we don't use them for a while we get rid of them.  We may have bought 
a new jar of honey last month, so it's fine, but if the cinnamon is a 
year old it's gotta go (but why punish the honey for the cinnamon's 
age).


As a side note:  the big thing I have a struggle with in my kitchen 
is getting people to change utensils (or wash them between dishes).  
I don't like my veggie stew stirred with a spoon that was just in 
meat broth -- it kind of misses the point.  I'm less concerned about 
the vegetarians (because we're not talking about a lot of meat here) 
than I am about allergies.  My sister-in-law was deathly allergic to 
eggs (man was that a scary reaction to watch), so I got used to 
making sure that nothing she would have could possibly be TOUCHED by 
egg.  How does everyone else out there get around this / enforce it?

Claricia Nyetgale
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