[Sca-cooks] Atlantian 12th Night Feast

[Lisa Mitchell]

Early in 2004 a bunch of Stierbach cooks were travelling home from an event.
To keep themselves awake they started to plan an elaborate Twelfth Night
feast. A 3 or 4 remove, sit-down feast for 400 people. Independently, other
members of the Barony of Stierbach were looking at large event sites. Thus,
was born the Twelfth Night bid.

The site for the Atlantia's Twelfth Night is a purpose-built wedding and
conference center with two large catering kitchens. The catering kitchens
are designed for professional caterers to bring in their own kitchen
equipment to warm previously prepared entrees, but not to prepare food on
site.

This is not the institutional kitchen we would have liked. So after the
first site visit, the autocrat and I insisted that the cooking team make a
site visit to see if they could work in the kitchens. The cooking team
agreed that they could work with the site - if we rented appropriate
equipment. Only after the cooks gave an OK did we start to shape the bid.

How are we making this work? By renting catering stoves to bake/roast items
and heat sauces. And we have jet burners to heat water for boil-in-bag items
like venison stew. This should cover our needs as many of the dishes will be
pre-cooked and will just need to be warmed.

However, some of the dishes will need to be cooked on site. With the site's
approval, these will be cooked in a tent on the concrete loading dock at the
rear of the building.

It's not all doom and gloom so come and join us for a wonderful event and a
delicious feast. And if you decide to go off-board we'll have a list of
local restaurants. (However, with northern Virginia prices, many of them
will cost you more than $10 per person for a meal.)

If you have any questions, please contact me directly at cwymarc at comcast.net

Many thanks for your time,

Ceridwen ferch Rhys ap Michael
Seneschal, Barony of Stierbach

I may not have all the answers but I know who to ask.