SC - Grapenuts Kvass

[Jeff Gedney]

I think that the problem with your confits was that the judges didn't know what
they were looking at.  I had a similar problem with a kimono that I entered in an
interkingdom competition some years ago.  The judges had never really seen
anything quite like what I entered (a ceremonial kosode with appliqued and
embroidered decoration), and didn't understand. I don't think they even read my
documentation (several pages' worth, along with a full page of bibliographical
references)...I say this because one of their criticisms was that I did not
provide pictures of period examples of this type of ornamentation (I had
indicated that no examples of this from the period in question existed).  So,
when I enter a competition any more, I have learned to either enter something
that I know is familiar to any who may be judging...or take it as a given that
what I have done will likely be misunderstood!

Kiri

ChannonM at aol.com wrote:

> In a message dated 7/27/00 11:02:10 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
> owner-sca-cooks at ansteorra.org writes:
>
> > So perhaps when you enter a piece on which you spent a ton of time and
> >  grew/milled the ingredients (or grew/sheared/spun/wove) you should enter
> >  them as multiple entries.  Save back some of the flour, maybe even some of
> >  the grain if you grew it.  Write up how you milled it separately and how
> >  it was grown.  True, a judge may look at a pile of flour as an entry and
> >  laugh,  but if you researched period milling and flour grain size and did
> >  your best to re-create it, you should be recognized for your ability as
> >  milling and _NOT_ your cooking skills, since cooks didn't mill.
> >
> >  My question (though I am sure other conversations will come from the
> >  above) is:
> >  Other than a multiple entry piece, how should we be dealing with projects
> >  built from scratch so that we are not overstating the fact of what period
> >  cooks did, and not understating the talents of the entrant?
> >
> >  Cu drag,
> >  Bogdan
>
> These questions have bothered me too.First of all, let me state that I am not
> whining, I am very happy with the overall experience of particitpating and
> felt that the judges comments had valid points. I submitted an A&S entry on
> confits, and one of the comments was that I should have ground my sugar by
> hand in a mortar (I agreed, I actually had some sugar in a mortar that was
> ground by hand for display but the actually cooking quantity was done  by
> machine- I have tendonitis and carple tunnel(sp?) so it is not reasonable for
> me to hand grind much of anything if I want to hold a cup of coffee
> afterwards, this was explained in my documentation)
> I used various seeds and nuts as the medium of the confits. It was pointed
> out that I would have gotten higher marks had I grown my own seeds (ie,
> coriander and anise, fennel are all easily grown in my area.) I have actually
> taken to growing coriander for the next Kingdom A&S just to follow through.
> As well, I have set aside rose petals I grew for period colouring and will
> use things like saffron and maybe spinach for other colours (I had used food
> dye)
>
> In retrospect, though, I'm not so sure that a cook would have been ensuring
> that they grew their own seeds ( wouldn't they have gotten these from a
> spicer, or from the gardener or their manor etc?)
>
> I can see the cook needing to discriminate as to what is good coriander and
> what is bad coriander as to how it would effect their dish. But as to
> actually growing it, I'm not sure they would have done that. Would they have
> overseen the gardens? Wasn't there a Master Gardener who would have done this
> instead?
>
> In addition the submission was placed in a category that was all wrong, the
> only one they said it could go in was "Illusion foods", well, confits are no
> illusion nor do they try to be, so I lost points for that too.
>
> Well, I can't complain as I did well for a first time submission (it took a
> first anyway). I have included the suggestions of the judges where I felt
> they improved the work. I look forward to hearing others interpretations.
>
> Hauviette
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