[Sca-cooks] Feast costs/budgets

[Nick Sasso]

-----Original Message-----
That August Personage uses recipes??? What a hack! ;-)

Seriously, though, I must admit honestly that I don't always test
recipes in real time, either; more often I do a simulation run in my
head. But it's probably a combination of experience and extreme luck
to have gotten away with it all these years, and I certainly would
neither counsel my method for anyone not comfortable with it, or for
anyone for whom there's another method that works better. I am all
about doing what works for people. > > > > > > > > >


Master A.,
I think that there are some people in this world who can look at a piece of
cloth and see the garment, a piece of stone and see the scultpure.  You and
I had a discourse several years back about being able to see/think/envision
in tastes and textures.  Not everyone has the ability, and not everyone can
learn it.

I have always written rcipes in case of disaster response . . . . and only
two recipes have I ever tested ahead of time.  Both were "failures" and
unused only they didn't fit the menu.  Though they both turned out as I
envisioned them, though.  I have a bit of confidence in my ability to
communicate to others what I envisioned, and can put it on paper for others
to read and perform.  If it just stays in my head, then no chance it will
succeed as a feast item . . . I cannot perform 26 dishes myself for 150+
people and survive.

One particular event will always stand out as a triumphant weekend that I
worked with Serena da Riva and a group of people who truly transcended to
create a weekend of food that was far more than the menu and recipes and
planning would have suggested.  All the planning and recipes and stuff would
have been great anyway . . . but sometyhing happened that weekend that I
just cannot quantify.  YIKES!! That was six years ago now.  The three of us
primary cooks did some mighty fine work together for a few years there in
Meridiean kitchens.

niccolo difrancesco