[Sca-cooks] cooking for a vigil

[Anne-Marie Rousseau]

Good advice, Katriona!

In addition to tapping the person who asked you to cook to pony up :), in my
experience, people don’t go to vigils to EAT. They want nibbles so they have
something to do with their hands and to keep the vigil-ee (vigilante? ;)
from passing out from starvation.

Food food as in a meal type stuff is hard to serve, lots of work and
expensive. 

Think nuts (no shells means no cleanup, BTW), dried fruit, shortbread
cookies, pickles, olives (again no pits means you wont have to be coming
pits out of the carpet later), pitchers of drinking water, etc. 

I've catered a number of vigils and had really good luck asking the
vigil-ees already-laurelled friends to bring a batch of this or that (small
tarts of savory or sweet, you may need to provide recipes :); sliced deli
meat, sliced cheese and those whole grain bread rolls with a small bowl of
mustard; heck, even hummous with carrots, cucumbers and pita wedges makes a
non period and very vigil friendly protein source 

If you really want a hot protein thing, I've had good luck taking my
favorite period sauced meat dish (pomegranate chicken, or pork in fig sauce
for example), precook the meat in bite sized lumps. Put with the sauce in
the crockpot and serve hot with those long bamboo skewers and cocktail
napkins (no plates, no forks and the skewers can get tossed into the fire or
compost)

Most importantly, as Katriona says, talk to the person who hit you up for
this generous donation of your time and energy. Find out what htye had in
mind, and be very clear on what you're willing and able to do. There's no
shame in setting clear boundries ahead of time :)

Good luck! Catering vigils is a fun way to be part of your friends special
day :)

--Anne-Marie

-----Original Message-----
From: sca-cooks-bounces+dailleurs=liripipe.com at lists.ansteorra.org
[mailto:sca-cooks-bounces+dailleurs=liripipe.com at lists.ansteorra.org] On
Behalf Of Katherine Kretchmar
Sent: Sunday, October 17, 2010 6:42 AM
To: Cooks within the SCA
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] cooking for a vigil

Is there a peer who is overseeing the elevation process?  The one who
asked you to cook?  Talk to that person.

1)  Let the peer in question know that you are happy to do the cooking
and coordinating (assuming that is what you want), but that you need
help either aquiring or paying for the ingredients.  Let the peer know
you cannot be there all day.  There is a good chance that s/he will
be, or that a spouse/SO will, or some other plan.

3)  Ask the peer to post on the peerage mailing list (if your kingdom
has one) a plea for donations to the vigil food.  Ask who else you are
allowed to tell so that you can ask more people.  You may be told no
one, sorry.  Give her/him a list of things you are looking for, either
specific items or general categories.  Ask that you be the person they
tell, or that the peer keep you in the loop.  Beware - many will wait
until the last moment to tell you.  The easiest to ask for is things
that cost money and you aren't going to sook anyways, such as cheese,
sausage, fruit, nuts, whatever.  Also realize that donations may have
nothing to do with the theme you have set, and just be gracious.  When
I did a vigil feast that was all Andalusian Jew, with dairy and meat
kept separate, and a pelican brought cheese with sausage in it, I had
to just suck it up and thank her, and figure out where to put it.  You
also can tell a few close friends that you are doing this project,
without telling anything about who or what peerage, and ask for help.

If you would like more thoughts, feel free to email me privately.  I
am not the person to talk about with research or feast-sized cooking,
but working with peers and coordinating volunteers I can do.

Katriona




On Sat, Oct 16, 2010 at 8:11 PM, Irmgard <irmgart at gmail.com> wrote:
> I find myself tapped to cook for a surprise vigil in late February,
> and am VERY exited about the opportunity, but... I'm concerned about a
> few of things.
>
> 1) Obviously, I will take into account the allergies/likes/dislikes of
> the person to be elevated and the immediate family/friend group, but I
> really don't want to have to provide ingredients for everything I (or
> someone else) make. I also don't want to be completely tied to the
> vigil area for the whole day.  Are either really necessary?
>
> 2) How should I figure out how many people to plan on feeding? I
> really don't want to run out of food, even if we do run out of some
> things.
>
> 3) I'm seriously short on fundage, and will probably be for the
> foreseeable future. What is a good way to get people to donate either
> money, ingredients or finished dishes w/o the recipient finding out? I
> can't exactly post over the local mailing list, and I'm new enough to
> not be sure who I can trust not to spill the beans.. :)
>
> 4) How feasible is it to serve a soup/stew? I have access to several
> crock pots, and possibly an electric roaster.
>
> help me please?
>
> Many thanks in advance,
>
> ~Irmgard
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> Sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org
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>
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