[Sca-cooks] This 'n that

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Kirrily Robert:
>Leaving aside your actual questions, to which I don't really know the
>answer... I have to say I'm amazed that any feast cook doesn't do prep
>work ahead of the feast.  How many do you normally cook for?  How many
>staff do you normally have?  How do you manage?  Please tell!

While I believe that most cooks in the SCA do some pre-cooking at
various times, it's not really required, and one could argue that
under some circumstances, there are some advantages to doing it all
in one day.

I used to do two or three feasts a year with little or no pre-prep
(also no advance shopping, which had one cook in my kingdom publicly
accuse me of mismanaging my group's funds; she said anyone who didn't
comparison shop weeks in advance prior to the event to save every
penny "should be shot"). Simply put, I was from a restaurant
background, where most of the best ones have cooks that show up in
the morning with the freshest ingredients, prep, cook, serve, clean
up, and go home.

Adamantius