[Sca-cooks] the idea of a Kingdom Cooks Guild

[Patricia Collum]

Replied to off-line.

Cecily
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Laing" <paxford at gil.com.au>
To: <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Sent: Friday, January 10, 2003 6:40 PM
Subject: [Sca-cooks] the idea of a Kingdom Cooks Guild


> >Well, it looks like we're getting organized here in Atenveldt. Do you
folks
> have suggestions on >maybe what not to do in setting up a guild, so we can
> avoid problems?
>
> >Cecily
>
> Hi Cecily!
>
> Up until May of last year I was the Administrator for the Lochac Guild of
> Cooks, and am still am active member so I have a few ideas of the
structure
> you're looking at forming.
>
> I can send you a copy of the current Guild's charter if you would like
> (please email me privately as I'll need to send it from my work account
> whence the document is electronically stored).
>
> A Ranking system is currently in place in our Guild - it's flawed and
> difficult to monitor and it's restructuring is listed for discussion for
the
> 2003 AGM (as per the 2002 minutes).  As it stands a person only needs to
> have a dish made & presented at their local SCA event or meeting (must be
an
> advertised SCA meeting - not a private household parties/dinner) and
obtain
> feedback from 3 attending & munching fellow Scadians (not necessary for
them
> to be Cooks Guild members) and then they need to send the paperwork
> (including recipe & source documentation) to the Admin for registering of
> effort & increase in rank. This works okay - in my term as Administrator I
> didn't see any submissions of work that included negative feedback and
some
> that contained very good pieces of advice to the cook.
>
> The difficulty lies in ensuring that each rank attains a certain average
> level of skill and knowledge before proceeding to the next level and since
> there are no rules/regulations on how to achieve this we currently have a
> very mixed bunch of people - those that use basic texts such as "Plyn
delit"
> for all submissions and those that track down the original, translate it,
> transpose it to modern amounts & weights and then cook & present it; those
> that understand what is meant by "and cook until done" and those that
won't
> touch a recipe that doesn't have the exact cooking time listed...  So
> consider Standarization carefully before installing a Ranking system (and
> look at introducing Mentoring as a means of ensuring that the basic skills
> of each level are meet).
>
> In my opinion the ranking system can work & work well *IF* checks and
> balances are introduced from the very beginning.  Trying to introduce them
> later results in wonderful "discussions" between those that want to go
that
> extra step and those content to coast along at the lowest level allowable
>
> Just my penny's worth
>
> Marion de Paxford
> Kingdom of Lochac (Australia)
>
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