[Sca-cooks] Investiture Feast - this past weekend - review - LONGISH

[Jonathan and Rebecca Barber]

Good Evening - 

This past weekend I cooked a feast for 150 people for the invesiture of the new Baron and Baroness of Erud Sul.  The menu, recipes and documentation are available on my website: http://www.neversimple.com/ErudSulInvestiture.htm

We did some prep work in advance - the veggies were peeled and cut up in advance, the meat was also cut up in advance, the spaetzle was made in advance and frozen and the cookie dough was prepared and put in to cut-and-bake sized rolls.  The sauerbraten and veggies were marinated overnight.  (The veggies could have marinated longer but we were pleased with the sauerbraten.)

Serving presented some challenges, first and foremost in that the local group was well short of serving dishes for the number of tables.  This resulted in a few choices that in the end looked better.  For example, the Spaetzle was placed on the platter.  We cut the sauerbraten like london broil, tossed it in the sauce and then put the meat and sauce over the Spaetzle.  The Hens from Greece went out on a bed of rice.  On both cases we left some free area around the outside so that there would be plain starch for people who wanted it.

The mustards were....younger than might be desirable.  The pear was hot with a nice touch of sweet afterwards but would have mellowed out nicely had it had more time.  I can't know for sure though as there were no leftovers *grin*.  The course mustard was definitely something you needed to have a taste for but those who liked it LOVED it.  

The cookies were FABULOUS!  They had a nice spicy bite.  As stated in the notes I took the proportions of the spices in the cookie recipe from the period recipe but went a little more like cookies for the texture.  The powdered sugar we sprinkled on top helped make it a touch more accessible for the people who didn't like foods spicy.  Regardless, they were incredibly tasty and went quickly.

We did have a couple of small problems.  3 chickens were sent back to the kitchen because the tables felt they were undercooked.  The breast meat was completely cooked and the thighs were up to temperature, but the chickens were very juicy so people were confused.  We cut the breasts off, took breasts off of a couple of extra chickens we had and replated with more rice and pork before sending back out.

The other problem was a an embarrassment of riches.  We were given a count of 150 sold and a waiting list.  It turned out that these were unpaid reservations.  In the end we served 124.  (Thus the extra chickens.)  Worse, there were only 85 people on site at the time of the sideboard, meaning we had LOTS of leftover beef-barley soup and bean soup.  However we came in right around budget and I am now well supplied with spices that I bought back after dinner.

Anyway, thank you for your comments on Spaetzle and Sauerbraten!

Ru