food in the SCA

[cellio]

anastasiav has been asking some interesting questions about what people look for in SCA feasts (and lunches). You should go read all the discussion on her posts, but I'm going to copy some of my comments here too.

What makes a great luncheon buffet at an SCA event?

Speaking generally: period tasty food, compatible with the weather and event activities (e.g. summer fighting events are different from spring schola etc), variety of food groups including vegetarian protein, attention to presentation. If there is no place for me to leave the dirty dishes until dinner, finger food.

What foods/types of foods do you most like to see on a lunch board?

Vegetable pasties (e.g. spinach) or tarts (e.g. ember-day), fish, bread, cheese, fresh fruit in season that won't leave me with pits/cores/stems to dispose of (so, e.g. sliced apples rather than whole ones), hard-boiled eggs, nuts, pickles.

What foods do you always move past?

Meat, olives, mushrooms, blatantly-modern food, anything messier than I'm prepared to deal with.

(And a later thought: anything where I can't determine to my satisfaction that there are no unsafe ingredients. Pie shells, for example, might contain lard, so I will consult any posted ingredients list, ask, or pass.)

What food do you wish you saw on a lunch board but actually never see?

"Never" isn't bringing anything to mind, but in the "almost never" space, fish (not shellfish) in pretty much any form. Smoked salmon, fish pies of various sorts, herring... all of that works, but the SCA seems to be somewhat fish-averse except for the occasional appearance of shrimp.

1) We can all agree that not enough food is a problem. But at what point does it become "too much" food? Is three courses (around 15 dishes) plus fruit and nuts at the end too much? Is it a question of time (ie: we've been here forever, lets go home) or being stuffed?

There are two different aspects, variety and quantity. In terms of overall quantity, if the first course had enough food for a full meal and then there are two more courses, that's too much. But on the other hand, if you're sending out small quantities of lots of different things, three courses might or might not be enough in terms of total quantity. It just depends.

Most experienced cooks I know use some metrics along the lines of N oz meat, X cups starch, Y cups vegetables, etc, where these values can be context-adjusted. IMO a feast at a typical event [1] should go about 2 hours, which supports 2 or 3 courses plus a dessert board. How much variety you can pack into each course depends on your kitchen, your crew, and to some extent your budget. I'm used to seeing about four items per course, give or take one.

[1] By "typical event" I mean fighting and other physical activities during the day, maybe a short court, feast, maybe dancing in the evening. Contrast with, e.g. a university (might want food to be quick to allow more class time), or 12th night (4 hours for the meal, split into 2 chunks with dancing or court in between could be fine), or a performers' revel (might want to have a longer feast but with entertainment breaks), or...

2) Non-fast day Medieval feasts (at least as we have documentation for them) were very meat heavy, but of course many in the SCA are vegetarian (for a variety of reasons) and most of us agree that in modern meals meat should only be a small portion of a balanced meal. How do you feel about the balance between these two things, in terms of what is served at a sit-down feast? Obviously there needs to be a filling (and tasty) vegetarian entree, but how many of the remaining dishes should be 100% vegetarian?

If I paid full price for the feast and I can't eat at least two-thirds of it, I will be grumpy. A mushroom tart and all the bread I can eat doesn't make for a satisfying meal. So most dishes should be vegetarian or at least vegetarian-possible (e.g. there's a small pot of soup available that wasn't made with beef stock for those who want). Cooks should think carefully about use of problem ingredients where they don't really have an impact; I'm totally cool with the roasted chicken with meat-based stuffing (how could it not be?), but using the pan drippings to flavor the rice on the side can feel gratuitous to me.

At feasts I often see a lot of meat, a lot of starch (bread, rice, noodles), and not very much with actual vegetables. I realize that we don't have as many period recipes for vegetables; I don't know to what extent it is a different balance in the meal versus them not bothering to write some things down as carefully. (I mean, we also don't have a lot of bread recipes compared to meat dishes, but we know that bread was often central to a meal...)

Assuming you don't know the cook personally, what would convince you to pre-reserve for an evening feast?

Unless I not only know the cook but know that the cook is inclined to cook enough food I can eat, I absolutely require a menu. I don't want to be told "there'll be something for vegetarians"; I want to make the decision myself (too many bad experiences with "something for vegetarians" meaning "bread, and you can pick the meat out of the stew, can't you?").

I won't leave an event to go get food, so beyond this, it's a matter of whether we are staying for dinner or leaving before. That's a decision we will make jointly. It is informed by planned activities (e.g. is there dancing after dinner?) and density of people we want to socialize with who are staying for dinner.

Comments

[baron-steffan.livejournal.com]

You should be eating meat! Meat's good for you!

Oh, yeah. Love that. But you don't have to be vegan to experience this sort of thing. My disfavorite variation is "Of course it's rare, even though you want medium-well. You should want rare. Rare is better! Everybody knows that!"

Gastronazis. I bloody hate 'em.

Re: picking the meat chunks out...I imagine there are folks who, not being into vegetarianism themselves, don't understand what it really entails, and feel that "not eating meat" = "not eating meat", if you get my drift. 'Course, yes, an SCA kitchener ought to know this stuff, but still...How many people think "keeping kosher" = "picking out the pork bits", after all.

[cellio]

When I ask at restaurants, I ask if there are any meat products in the item in question, "such as meat stock or fat". I've still been surprised (really, bacon bits in the mashed potatoes???), but being more specific does seem to help. (Generally in restaurants I try to steer clear of anything that stands a reasonable chance of being problematic, leaving the unreasonable chances for me to sort out...)