SC - Re: Ladies

[Seton1355@aol.com]

In a message dated 5/10/99 2:58:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time, Jeffinator 
writes:

<< I'm sorry I was unable to attend Ladies Tourney,  I heard that the feast 
(was) just wonderfull.  I would have really liked to have sampled some of 
your cookery!
 
 Thorstein. >>

No apologies are necessary. Things went well. Puck and Elysant came down from 
Rhode Island and Conneticut respectively. And , of course Dana was there 
also. The presence of these 3 of my students with Brychen's mom as back up 
proved to be very effective and we soon began working  like a well oiled 
machine.. I started preparation with bread baking at 2 PM Friday afternoon 
and was jioned by Puck, Elysant and Dana around 8 PM. We worked on stripping 
the meat from 2 goats for the kabobs and 60 lbs. of chicken thighs and legs 
for the sausages until about 2 AM and resumed prep work at 8 AM Saturday 
morning. Puck made the last yell. "It's done!' at 6:53 PM ( full 7 minutes 
before feast was scheduled to be served. I was ecstatic and the whole crew 
did the kitchen Happy dance. 

Service began at 7 PM as scheduled with a 10 munute break between succeeding 
courses before we started dishing up that couirse. Serving was taken care of  
by 1 person from each table and only 2 dishes had to find homes. They went to 
 the youngins table who , by that time, already had bulging bellies and wide 
eyes although I was surprised to see how much teenagers really can pack away. 
:-) They were trying to be very sophisticated and trying to outdo each other 
in who was brave enough to eat this or that particular dish. It made me  very 
emotional when one of them  quietly came up to later and embarrissingly 
muttered. : "Good food, Ras". Sort of made it all worthwhile.....

The nicest 'surprise of the evening was when the  kitchen creww, with much 
loud stomping and table banging was called out. We were faced with 
thuinderous applause  and embarrassingly stood there watching everyone let 
their food get cold while they rose in a mass to give us a standing ovation. 
I almost lost it as a tear started down my face.

Master Cormac told me later that it was the best fest he had ever eaten in at 
an SCA event. He even ate  the spinach dish even though he always hated 
spinach before he tried that one. :-) 2 other spinach haters were also 
converted. :-) 

Several people dropped by with gifts of thank-you, a wasail mix, a bag of 
Hershey's almond Nuggets, a seed packet  for growing those mixed salad greens 
that are currently chic. They were placed on the Kitchen altar.

Puck and Elysant were wonderful people. Without their help none of this would 
have been possible. Puck is a wonder to behold in the kitchen, a real natural 
and he has the potential to be one of the best SCA cooks around. I let him 
prepare not a few of the main recipes in the feast and as seen above, they 
were excellent. I would have liked to have gifted him with his green belt but 
you know how that is. :-(. You should have tasted the dry mead he made. It 
was GREAT! He also shared another brew which tasted somewhat of caraway that 
was also wonderful. I am so glad we had a chance to actually work together 
and can now list him as a good friend.

I rapidly came to think of Elysant as my kitchen sprite. Her bubbly and 
cheery personality was a welcome addition in the kitchen and her perfomance 
was superb. The calmong affect of her presence was a real and valuable gift 
to the whole staff. That coupled with great beauty and charm made it a real 
pleasure to have her in my kitchen proving that big things are often found in 
small packages.

All in all I was very pleased with this feast. 

Ras
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