[Sca-cooks] Dayboards

[Anne-Marie Rousseau]

hey all from Anne-Marie

in serving both food weenies and the mroe adventurous (food weenies dont
have to be in armor...some otherwise enlighted folks are cautious about
what they ingest :)).....

one can serve both by making food that is adaptable.

roast or grill a meat or simple fennel based sausage simply, with perhaps
salt and pepper. Make an interesting medieval sauce and serve it on the
side. Also serve stone ground mustard. Both are very period. Folks can
decide for themselves what if anything they put on their hunk o' flesh.

bread. Simple boring bread. Again, even the most timid eater will recognise
it and eat it. For those of us more into interesting food, we can eat the
yummy medieval sauce with it :).

green salad. Straight leaf lettuce (not iceberg). Have a vinegrette
dressing on the side. Very period, and very recognisable, and adaptable for
the folks who dont like vinegar. (can you imagine? :))

pickled stuff, olives, hard eggs, cheese, etc are all safe, familiar and
fairly period (depending on what they are). Thing is, they tend to be
relatively expensive.

there are a variety of veggie preparations that are not "wierd". Stewed
mushrooms. colliflower cooked in milk with an egg lemon sauce (can you say
hollendaise?). Braised cabbage. Stewed greens. Spinach tart. mushroom
cheese pie. serve a variety so the people who dont eat mushrooms can eat
the greens, for example. Make sure they're well labelled with what they are
(call it buttered greens instead of "wortes") and all the ingredients. Say
"spices" instead of "poudre forte". make it as familar sounding as possible.

for dessert, an apple pie with hazelnuts? or perhaps a fillo lemon pastry?
or a simple custard pie (there's a great version that has pears in it.
yum). Again, lable everything clearly ("custard pie" not "dariole") and
make sure to list ingredients in plain english as well. instead of making
five pies the same, try making a couple different kinds so folks can choose
what suits their tastes.

a few years ago we did a "period" lunch buffet at 12th night. We served
cold roast beef, mustard and horseradish sauces on the side, manchets,
sliced cheese (hey, if they squished them together to make a sandwich I
just looked the other way :)), raw baby carrots, pickled things, hard
boiled eggs, fresh fruit (grapes, tiny oranges (it was 12thnight :)),
apples, etc) and an assortment of period cookie like objects. Even our food
cautious baron was happy (well, ok, he thought the horse radish was ranch
dressing and ate a big glop on a carrot, but hey! that's not my fault! did
he REALLY think I'd have served ranch dressing at an SCA event??!!!!! :))

hope this helps some....
--Anne-Marie