SC - Re: New World Food Rant / Counter Rant

[Huette von Ahrens]

- --- RANDALL DIAMOND <ringofkings at mindspring.com>
wrote:
[with snippage here and there]

> The point is, at least in my kingdom, the feast is
> first and foremost
> to feed hungry people.   While peacock, swan , crane
> and other birds;
> haunches of venison, beef, huge pork pies are
> wonderful and period
> as hell,  few feastcrats can budget them.  If you
> want to feed the
> crowned fortunate few with exotics, great.   I see a
> huge amount of
> effort to make "mock" versions of some of the early
> period birds with
> chickens.  If I can't have the real thing served, I
> would rather have
> an affordable substitute that was actually done in
> period. My object
> is edible food in quantity, not miniscule portions
> of unfamiliar "period
> food".
>  If you want a "theme'
> feast, great; disguise
> turkey as something in period.  Don't bankrupt the
> shires by paying the
> premium for goose or doing something ridiculous like
> actually slaughtering
> and serving swans or cranes.  You don't have to call
> it turkey, if you are
> faking these exotics anyway.  I have done the real
> thing in feast dishes
> many
> times and thought it worth the effort, though
> getting the items was a
> financial pain.   However, a lot of expensive and
> unfamilar 100% pre-New
> World period food gets scraped into the garbage can.

> Akim Yaroslavich
> "No glory comes without pain"

Akim, I don't know where you live, but in Caid, beef
and pork come in affordable ranges.  I have also
served duck, and goose, and lamb, and salmon at
various banquets.  I will agree with you about the
real exotics like crane or porcupine or beaver.  But
not beef, pork, lamb, duck, goose, salmon. 

A good feast manager can budget even expensive items
that will not add to the overall cost of the feast if
they budget carefully, purchase it when it is on sale,
and put it in the correct place in the feast.

When I know I am going to do a banquet, I make sure
that I have a fairly large empty freezer available for
purchasing all meats when they are at their lowest
price.  I did a Twelfth Night feast several years ago
and I served chicken and duck for the first course,
lamb and oxtail for the second course and salmon for
the third course.  The salmon I purchased for $1 per
pound in Sept. when it was salmon season.  I purchased
the lamb and oxtail in Oct. for about $1.50 per pound.
The duck and chicken were purchased in Dec. at $1.25
and .50 per pound respectively.  All were held in the
freezer until I was ready to start cooking.  I charged
$12 for the feast, which included the hall rental in
the price, and I made a profit.  If you know how to
manage a feast properly, then no baronial or kingdom
coffers get depleted and no one leaves the table
hungry.

Huette
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com