[Sca-cooks] Aten Policy: The only reservation is a PAID reservation. (long)

[Carol Eskesen Smith]

     Ah, the memories this brings back...  Manymany years ago I cooked a Twelfth Night feast in Bakhail, in the East Kingdom.  One week before the feast, we had 90 "reservations", half of them paid.  Over 200 people arrived at our door expecting to be fed.  The Chief Troll did check with the head cook (me) at every 10 or 15 people, and I foolishly thought we could do it.  Only 15 more?  Ya, sure, we can do it.  NOT!  And I did this EVERY TIME!  Can anyone say "brain dead"?  
     This after an oven fire destroyed half our Pies of Parys the night before.  We were doing roast lamb, in honor of our King (His Grace, Sir Cariadoc of the Bow), and had a 20-lb lamb in the oven.  Let me tell you all, 20 lb of lamb doesn't go anywhere NEAR as far as 20 lb of roast pig!  And although we made lots more sausage (much of it never saw casings), we didn't come close to feeding the starving hordes.
    At any rate, as head of the Kingdom Cooks Guild, I made it official policy that at any event involving the Guild, a phoned reservation wasn't worth the paper it was written on, and if the reservation didn't come complete with check, it wasn't a real reservation.  By the time this got published in Pikestaff (the next issue), I was Crown Princess, so it had a LOT of weight behind it, and became kingdom policy for many years.  It might be a good idea to re-institute it; we do well with it in Ostgardr, right, Master A?

Regards,
Brekke (older than dirt)
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Mary Morman 
  To: SCA-Cooks 
  Sent: Tuesday, July 01, 2003 5:13 PM
  Subject: [Sca-cooks] Aten Policy


  My thanks to Johnna for sending me the text in a form I could read.

  I'll start by saying that - having cooked in the East kingdom, albeit 
  many years ago - I understand where Brangwayna and AdamAnt are coming 
  from.  To them the policy seems very restrictive.  However, after twelve 
  years in the Outlands - an Aten rite kingdom - I think I have a clearer 
  idea about what problems the rules are trying to fix.

  The policy clearly states the number of people who are allowed to be 
  comped.  That's vital.  I have cooked way too many feasts over the past 
  ten years where as many as 16 people - NOT including servers - are 
  expected to be fed out of the monies expended per head for the rest of 
  the hall, and this can be the same whether the feast is for 80 or for 
  180.  I would REJOICE at having the Aten limitations adopted and 
  enforced as policy in my kingdom.

  While the $ per head limit does seem a little low, I don't find it 
  unreasonable.  Especially if it is indeed PER HEAD rather than the 
  amount for only the paying customers with more than a dozen "freebies" 
  expected at no additonal cost.

  I would be overjoyed to see an official kingdom policy that made the 
  only real reservation a paid reservation.  That's the way I learned to 
  cook SCA feasts in the East and Atlantia.  It is NOT the way things are 
  done out here.  There is absolutely no expectation of any paid 
  reservations, and autocrats tend to feel privileged if they get some 
  number of unpaid reservations.  If you are living where the expectation 
  is to somehow cook for as many people as may come, and where a place 
  WILL be made for as many people as show up with the cook being told to 
  cook a bit more soup or head down to the grocery store for some of those 
  barbequeued chickens to stretch the feast - well then, this kind of 
  policy seems a welcome relief rather than an imposition.

  All in all, while the policies are definitely very bureaucratic, I 
  percieve them as an attempt to fix a problem, and think that, if 
  enforced, they will probably succeed.  If they do succeed then people 
  will learn different behaviors and in a couple of years, perhaps the 
  need for the policy will no longer exist.

  Elaina

  -- 
  To be humble to superiors is duty,
    to equals courtesy,
    to inferiors nobleness.
                  Benjamin Franklin


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