[Sca-cooks] Imaginary list was Re: Irish Stew recipe

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Also sprach Randy Goldberg MD:

>I recently served as co-Head Cook for an MSR event (for those of you
>unfamiliar, Medieval Scenarios and Recreations is a splinter group local to
>NYC and environs).

Some of us on this list will have heard of the MSR's "persona" of The
Kingdom of Acre... and those who have seen George Romero's
"Knightriders" have seen a fictionalized account of "The Debatable
Crown" and the formation of the MSR. It's not an especially good
movie, and not even especially [read "remotely"] accurate, but it's
really weird to see characters based on people you know portrayed by
actors on film (I was apprenticed to the herald character).

>  My co-chief decided we (a) HAD to serve roasted
>hunks-o-beef and

<snip>

>She showed me a grill out back made from half an old oil drum, two
>bags of charcoal (Match-Light, no less), a bottle of Lowry's Seasoned Salt,
>and 40 lbs of top round of beef. Yes, I spent the entire day outside
>grilling - in February in New York!

So, given this February, that was what, 55 degrees Fahrenheit? ;-)

>  Well, guess what - a liitle prayer, a
>LOT of cussing and a whole lot of more-or-less-constant turning and
>rearranging, and it was a smashing success. I managed to get almost every
>piece off the fire at just about medium-rare, and 80%+ got eaten. Her
>roasted chicken (she was smart and bought parts and cooked 'em at home, then
>just reheated them on the grill) was appreciated too, but not as much as the
>beef.

Welcome to the Revisionist Middle Ages. Another indicator that the
SCA (at least) has more to do with Tennyson's "Idylls of the King"
than with the Middle Ages.

>  Sadly, the rice in almond milk (20 quarts!) burned and had to be
>tossed (it was inedible, the whole pot tasted of the burn).

About this rice in almond milk -- did it simply burn, or did it
refuse to cook until you raised the heat up to maximum and cooked it
for two hours, _after_ which it burned? I ask because in cooking rice
in almond milk from a raw state, the oil component of the almond milk
seems to create a waterproof shield on each grain of rice, preventing
it from absorbing water. Most recipes (that I've seen) for rice in
almond milk, such as blankmanger, call for the rice to be cooked in
water until what modern cooks would consider "done", then it is
recooked in the almond milk to a risotto-ish consistency.

Adamantius