SC - Public Consumption [Was Distress in Trimaris]

[James F. Johnson]

Mary Morman wrote:
> 
> On Sat, 26 Feb 2000, James F. Johnson wrote:
> 
> <major snip about people not wanting to pay for food that experience tells
> them might be bad and offering them free taster portions of good food>
> 
> > Thoughts?
> >
> > Seumas
> 
> I have to disagree.  Tasting a portion of a good dish made for a demo may
> be a positive thing, but it has very little to do with eating part of a
> meal for 200 cooked in an inadequate kitchen.

True, both in quantity and availability of resources, but I'm not sure
where you are going with this. Is the good thing done by a tasting demo
undone by a feast done poorly in too small of a kitchen, or pointless
after the fact. I also don't see why historic cookery has to be
'limited' to grand scale of 50 or more feasters. Undoubtedly, it is
harder logistically to cook a feast for 200 in an inadequate kitchen,
but why make that the benchmark for the quality of historic cookery. One
advantage to cooking on a smaller scale is more control over the
quality. Perhaps once a person has tasted a good historic recipe, they
might consider a larger feast that wasn't quite as good was more due to
the scope and resources, not the recipe itself. Another advantage is
they can ask questions and you can answer them face to face right there. 
> 
> IM(not very)HO, the best way to teach people that period food is good is
> to cook excellent period feasts. 

So how do you get them in the door if they came into the SCA thinking
medieval food was mushy, bland, and horrid? Once in the door, yes, they
can be very persuaded. But you have to get them inside first. 

IM(not very)HO, that's what I and many
> others have done for years.  We've had some successes, we've had some
> failures, but when the people of a kingdom avoid paying for on-board in
> some locations, but base their travel plans on -definitely- not missing a
> feast in another location, that's the sign that a good cook and/or good
> cook's guild is at work.

I have a hard time imagining people from the whole of An Tir travelling
down to Summits just for a feast. But that goes beyond just cookery. I
would say part of the problem in my neck of the woods in human
resources. There are too few people still, and for the few that cook
well, they would begin to burn out in few years. There is one small
group in Adiantum that gets together to cook, and a few here in Glyn
Dwfn, but I know the group here has barely looked at period sources yet.
This area is heavily rural mundanely, and the neighbouring county is
economically strapped, discouraging feasting on board (and odd given
that Glyn Dwfn can boast never sending away a feaster hungry, if not
with extras in a sack.)

I do not advocate tasting demos replacing a good feast, just that it can
compliment a good feast by 'baiting' those that might not otherwise go,
and seems to be a lot quicker and more efficient that waiting for word
of mouth recommendations to change their minds and bring them in. We do
not yet have the population base here yet that would require
pre-registration and limits. There's been few feasts yet that I know of
that we didn't have room for another half dozen trenchers at the tables.

Seumas