SC - FW: Food fights at feasts

[Phil & Susan Troy]

In a message dated 10/12/98 2:26:33 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
pndarvis at execpc.com writes:

<< Being vegetarian,
 when I cook feasts and handle meat, I just kind of look at the meat and say
 "that's about 6 servings". >>

As do most experienced cooks. :-)

OTH, less experienced cooks or those that usually cook for 1 to 3 people may
have a difficult time judging portion sizes for a large group.  If the cook
has doubts about how much meat to buy for a feast, there are a couple of ways
to figure out the amount of meat needed. 

Buying individual portions is one option.  This eliminates any guess work and
meat portions are accurate for the x number of people.  This way is also the
most expensive.  In some cases the price per portion can be two to four times
higher than preparing your own portions.  If feast economy is a concern, this
type of portion control is not an option most kitchen stewards have.

There is a less expensive way to achieve similar results and have bones for
broth and fat for frying as an added bonus. 

A typical trimmed bomeless portion of mammal flesh is currently defined by the
USDA as 3 oz. !00 guests are attending the event. 100 x 3=300.  So we need 18
3/4 pounds of boneless meat.  You're couscous recipe calls for beef broth and
meat with the bone in and a thin layer of fat is less expensive.  We'll bring
the pound figure up to 20 pounds to account for the fat and add 1 ounce per
pound for the bone which leaves us with the figure of 27 pounds.  The final
figure allows for shrinkage wish is about 4 ounces per pound.  In our case it
is about 5 lbs. which gives us the figure of 32 pounds.  I then round up to
the next 5.  This gives us a final total of 35 pounds for 100 people.

Boneless, skinless chicken breasts are certainly convenient but the fact is
that the highest nobility would have insisted on the necks, tails and wings of
any birds.  The breast would have went to diners of less status.  They are
also very expensive with the breast of a single chicken often costing not much
less than a whole bird.  I always use whole chickens which I purchase packed
in crushed ice.  I use the necks, wing tips, gizzards, hearts and skin flaps
around the tail and neck for broth.  The livers and cut up cooked gizzards and
hearts, as well as the meat from the cooked necks plus someday old bread are
used for my signature dish-'Garbage.'  For portioning purposes count on one
bird for 4 to six people dependent on the recipe.  Chicken leg quarters are
often available locally for as little as 39 cents a pound.  These have the
backbone attached.  Remove it and use it for broth.

Ras
============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================