SC - My first feast is over. Here's what happened (part three):

[david friedman]

>What I learned:
>
>1)   There are good reasons for some of the steps that the recipes require,
>and any shorcuts I take, such as using pregrounds meat, needs to be properly
>justified befopre I use them.
>
>2)   My suppliers are not as interested in my timetables as I am, so I need
>to have proper storage arranged ahead of time and try to get my ingredients
>at least the night before.
>
>3)   I learned that four days of bulk shopping equals about 10 fully loaded
>trips down three flights of stairs on the morning of a feast.
>
>4)   A Geo Prism LSI will not carry all food for a hundred person three
>course feast in one trip, no matter how often I repack it
>
>5)   I was nuts to do this, but it was a good kind of nuts.
>
>6)   Properly presented food, made with an affection for flavors, is good
>food, and people will enjoy it, regardless of whether it is period, or
>vegetable based.
>
>7)   I need a large separate freezer, for prepared foods and bread dough.
>
>8)   Pizza ovens are a GOOD THING, especially for pies, and warming or
>baking bread on site
>
>9)   Frozen bread dough take a hekuva long time to proof
>
>Brandu
>
A couple of other useful rules:

Know where there is a grocery store near the site; and have someone with a
car who has agreed to be available to do last-minute shopping at the cook's
request.

If at all possible, do the entire feast in miniature (8 people, say), with
whatever assistant cooks you are going to have on the day, far enough in
advance of the day so that you can use the information gained to correct
for any problems you discover in this way.

I notice a difference between your approach and ours (this isn't a
criticism, just that you are starting in a different place): we do a whole
lot of experimental medieval cooking and only occasionally do feasts. The
result is that we are rarely trying to work out new recipes for any given
feast; what we have to worry about is budgets, scaling up recipes
(especially allowing enough time), and the like. You, in addition to doing
that, are having to work up a whole lot of new recipes, with the result
that (I get the impression) you had to scramble when a recipe you had
decided on didn't work out the way you originally wanted to do it. I am
impressed with the job you have done; I wish I could have been at the
feast; and I am glad it worked out well.

Elizabeth/Betty Cook


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