pot-luck-fsts-msg - 11/24/13

Handling pot luck feasts in the SCA.

NOTE: See also the files: headcooks-msg, feast-serving-msg, feast-ideas-msg,
feasts-fish-msg, feast-menus-msg, feast-decor-msg, kitchen-clean-msg.

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NOTICE -

This file is a collection of various messages having a common theme that I have collected from my reading of the various computer networks. Some messages date back to 1989, some may be as recent as yesterday.

This file is part of a collection of files called Stefan's Florilegium. These files are available on the Internet at: http://www.florilegium.org

I have done a limited amount of editing. Messages having to do with separate topics were sometimes split into different files and sometimes extraneous information was removed. For instance, the message IDs were removed to save space and remove clutter.

The comments made in these messages are not necessarily my viewpoints. I make no claims as to the accuracy of the information given by the individual authors.

Please respect the time and efforts of those who have written these messages. The copyright status of these messages is unclear at this time. If information is published from these messages, please give credit to the originator(s).

Thank you,
    Mark S. Harris                  AKA:  THLord Stefan li Rous
                                          Stefan at florilegium.org
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Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: fixit at delphi.dasd.honeywell.com
Subject: Re: Lothar and pot lucks
Organization: Honeywell Inc. DASD
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1993 21:32:52 GMT

Lothar notes:
[first how a pot-luck fails]

> 	The advantages of this feast are that it requires little or no
> kitchen or serving staff and you don't have to worry about left-overs.
> The disadvantages a) completely unauthentic (unless you count alms
> giving as a feast), b) have to stand in line for hours waiting your
> turn. Ah yes, the medieval ambience of an Army chow line...., c) you
> only have a 1/3 chance of getting well fed, d) no control over
> presentation or temperature of the food by the cooks, e) no portion
> control.

Consider this approach.

Let everyone sit down and place their contribution on the table in
front of their own service.

Next everyone stands up.  All folk may take something from their own dish.
(At least you know THAT is edible.)

Now move in an orderly fashion (you know, clockwise or something) to the
next dish, and the next and the next until your plate is full.

Return to your own seat and start eating.

RESULTS:

Everyone starts at the head of the line, by some food.  
Everyone gets something from someone else.
Everyone gets roughly the same portions.
Everyone starts eating at about the same time.

Feel better now?

Gunwaldt


From: djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu (Dorothy J Heydt)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Lothar and pot lucks
Date: 17 Nov 1993 22:51:15 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

In article <1993Nov17.143252.1 at delphi.dasd.honeywell.com>,
 <fixit at delphi.dasd.honeywell.com> wrote:
>
>Consider this approach.
>
>Let everyone sit down and place their contribution on the table in
>front of their own service.
>
>Next everyone stands up.  All folk may take something from their own dish.
>(At least you know THAT is edible.)
>
>Now move in an orderly fashion (you know, clockwise or something) to the
>next dish, and the next and the next until your plate is full. ...

If it's a very small gathering--everyone sitting at a single table would
be ideal--then that could work.  In a large gathering, many tables
packed closely into a room, it generates utter chaos.  They did it
at the recent Mists Investiture, and it _was_ chaos.  While there was
plenty of food, it was virtually impossible to get to it.  I sat down
and drank lots of Calistoga water. (And I don't care if it's OOP.)

Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin		Dorothy J. Heydt
Mists/Mists/West				UC Berkeley
Argent, a cross forme'e sable		djheydt at uclink.berkeley.edu


Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: fixit at astro.dasd.honeywell.com
Subject: Re: Lothar and pot lucks
Organization: Honeywell Inc. DASD
Date: Mon, 22 Nov 1993 15:08:52 GMT

I (Gunwaldt) describe a 'round robin' pot luck.

Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin then notes that
> If it's a very small gathering--everyone sitting at a single table would
> be ideal--then that could work.  In a large gathering, many tables
> packed closely into a room, it generates utter chaos.  They did it
> at the recent Mists Investiture, and it _was_ chaos.  While there was
> plenty of food, it was virtually impossible to get to it.

Ah the joys of autocrating.  I have seen this method fail due to poor
table arrangement.  I have also seen it work quite successfully for a
meal of 200+ (of course this might still be considered small in the Mists:)
Once a hall gets crowded, the very last thing you want is to encourage
everyone to get up and move around all at the same time.

Gunwaldt


From: fixit at astro.dasd.honeywell.com
To: Mark Harris
Subject: pot-luck serving
Organization: Honeywell Inc. DASD
Date: 29 Nov 1993 

Good health to you Lord Stefan.

In regards to your questions about 'round-robin' serving at pot luck 
meals, yes we have done this locally.  From a small gathering of about
30 up to a feast of over 200 (large by local standards.)

(Your words in quotes.)
"What happens when some have filled their plates and sat down."

Everyone is taking food at the same time.  Our experience shows that
most people's plates fill at about the same rate and a great number
'fill up' within a few seconds of each other so most folk are ready
to sit down at about the same time.

"Doesn't this lead to conjestion?"

If the table space requires both sides to be used then some conjestion
does occur.  If the hall is crowded you really don't want all the people
milling around at the same time anyway.  (Crowded can be to little floor
space in relation to tables, not just too many people.)  It definately 
works better if you have enough space to just use one side of the tables
for seating.  Our most conjested attempt was caused by using round
tables.  We plenty of floor space but still had mass confusion because
we couldn't establish a reasonable 'flow' to allow access to the food.
It really turned into a bazarre with people advertising their contributions.
 - Hey! I have compote! over here!! Plenty of compote! -

"Or do you perhaps leave one end of each table free of people 
for food rather than placing the food in the center of the table?"

When seating is tight we have tried to leave 1 seat open at each table 
and move all the dishes there after the first round.  Another attempt
was to hold back two tables (which made the seating really tight) and
then set them up and move the remaining food there after everyone had 
made a first pass.  Sort of like an 'after the fact' buffet table.
This was more work for the support staff but reduced the overall 
crowding on the tables and for those getting additional helpings.  It
also made it really obvious when the food was gone so people didn't 
have to go stalking all the tables looking for scraps.

Hope our experiences save you some headaches

Gunwaldt


Date: Thu, 22 Jan 1998 21:16:01 -0800
From: "Anne-Marie Rousseau" <acrouss at gte.net>
Subject: Re: Re: SC - Feast and Budget planning

We also run frequent potlucks, and these are usually very successful.
There's a few tricks, at least up here. Having the hosting barony provide a
meat main dish (paid for out of event fees), works well. Then you make sure
to hit up your friends who cook and ask them to bring Three quiches or
something along those lines, ie use them as shills. We also tend to assign
dishes by fun categories, ie persona (British Isles brings main dish,
mainland Europe brings side dish and middle eastern brings dessert), or by
how far they travelled (the folks assigned bread and cheese are those with
no kitchen within easy access). Oh, and make sure that folks know how much
food is an appropriate contribution. I say a dish that serves 8-10 people
is good for ONE person. Ie, a pie. A pie is not a contribution for you,
your lord and your three teenage kids.

I also find that someone in a Position of Authority standing up and going
over the rules for happy potlucks helps, ie:
1. there's lots of dishes. dont feel you need to take some of everything
2. if there's one thing you really love, you don't need to load your plate
up with it. Ask for the recipe so you can make it at home.
3. Look ahead of you at the amount of food on the table.
4. Look behind you at the line of people still to come.
5. Be sensible and polite and guage your portions accordingly.
6. DONT TOUCH THE FOOD WITH YOUR FINGERS!!!!!

Basic common sense stuff like that.

- --AM


Date: Wed, 26 May 1999 23:08:08 -0700
From: Anne-Marie Rousseau <acrouss at gte.net>
Subject: Re: SC - Pot Luck Part two....

Hi all from Anne-Marie

on potlucks....

I have had great success with potlucks in the past. The secret, my friends
is to fix it! Success is good planning, well executed.

If you're organizing the potluck, be sure to twist the arms of your friends
to bring something good, and lots of it. I often will personally bring a
large crock pot of bukkenade or other stew like substance or else two or
three tartes of flesche. Offer to provide easy recipes that are
transportable to anyoen who asks, and a few who dont. Ask the hosting
branch to donate money for a main dish, or tell everyone that the barony is
doing the bread (so hopefully not everyone brings bread).

Remind folks that they're supposed to bring a dish to serve 8-10 people.
Thats one dish for each person in their party! I tell folks to bring as
much food per person, as they expect to eat, volume wise. One pie is
sufficient for one adult person. Sure, no one would eat a whole pie, but
they'd have a slice of pie, and a hunk of meat and a slab of cheese, and a
piece of fruit, and...

Bring a LARGE stack of 3x5 cards and waterproof pens, like ballpoints, and
as people bring their food, give them a card to wrtie down what it is, and
what the ingredients are. Be sure to have extra serving gizmos, clearly
labelled with your name.

Arrange the tables so that you don’t end up with one big line. Go for two
lines at least. Have helpful cheerful people move up and down the line
offereing nibblies to the line waiters, or else call folks up table by
table so they can at least sit whle they wait.

Have some well respected person stand up at the start and review the
"rules"...dont take all of something, dont stick your fingers in the common
pot, dont take more than you can eat...look behind you at the people still
to come and look ahead at the amount of food left. Be polite, you can
always go back for seconds, etc etc. you'd be suprised how many people dont
know how to act. A gentle reminder goes a long way.

we are blessed here in Madrone to be surrounded by good cooks, and also by
good medieval cooks. I will attend potlucks here, and be assured of a
wonderful meal, even if I choose (as I often do) not to eat anything that
isnt medieval.

would that this were the case everywhere...there are some places where I
will NOT eat the potlucks, or the feasts, and before any feast I usually
call the head cook and find out what's on the menu. Nothing personal, just
wanna know if my $12 or whatever would be better used at that little French
restaurant I passed on the way to the site...

in any case, if you preplan a bit, and set up some skills to bring "good
stuff", you should be fine.

- --AM


Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 09:28:48 -0400
From: renfrow at skylands.net (Cindy Renfrow)
Subject: Re: SC - Pot Luck Part two....

<snip>
>>         Just a random question- are potlucks (or even the concept) period?
>> I don't know of any evidence that people brought dishes to a communal
>> feast (though I suspect there might have been something like that in small
>> villages), but we do have accounts opf community feasts sponsored and paid
>> for by individuals, families, guilds, confraternities, etc. I would think
>> a host mighthave been offended if someone brought food to a feast.
<snip>

Hello! IIRC, Madge Lorwin, in Dining with William Shakespeare, gave a brief
description of a 1650s-ish potluck get-together involving King James.
Anybody got the book handy? I think it's in the last chapter.

Cindy


Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 09:39:10 -0500
From: Stephanie E Rudin <mercedes71 at juno.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Pot Luck

Usually, If I know I will have access to eletricity, I will take barley
and beef broth and mushrooms and onions and just let them cook all day on
low in a crock pot.  Not a period recipe but it is perioid and it
introduces people to barley........  I've done the same with rice in a
slow cooker, also.

Mercedes


Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 01:44:28 EDT
From: Gerekr at aol.com
Subject: Re:  SC - Making Buffet-style serving work

>I've always thought that this would work ONLY if you had a server per dish
>(lunch ladies/gents) serving up reasonable portions.  I too have seen the
>front getting everything and the last getting almost nothing.

Well, if the attending Hats go last, and everyone KNOWS they're going to 
be going last, there's more likely to be better manners at the front of 
the line!  That system worked quite nicely in my area in the (ancient) 
past.  Don't know if it's still used.  Not so many potlucks these days.

It does help to portion some kinds of things in advance... slicing large 
hunks of meat, for example.  This also helps keep the line moving, if 
people don't have to stop and haggle with insufficient implements... and 
pre-cutting things can help suggest serving sizes.

Chimene


Date: Thu, 26 Apr 2001 23:16:33 -0700
From: Anne-Marie Rousseau <acrouss at gte.net>
Subject: Re:  SC - Making Buffet-style serving work

hey all from Anne-Marie

up here potlucks and buffet lines can work as well. As was previously
suggested, having a couple servers to help guide portion control is a good
thing.

another thing that has worked well is to have someone well known stand up
and give a little chat "I see we have lots of new people here. Welcome!
just so you know how this works, in a minute, we'll be asking you to go up
and get your food. Please be polite and take only a single portion...look
at the amount of food on the table, then look behind you at the number of
people who still need to go through the line. Please dont touch the food
with anything but the attatched utensils, and of course if there's anyone
still hungry, we'll be happy to let folks go through second (and third :))
times after everyones had a shot at going through once...." Educates the
new folks and if the people who should know better hear it again, that cant
hurt either....

We also will have a couple people who hold some representative stuff back
so half way through new food comes out...this saves the folks on the end of
the line from getting stuck with the KFC coleslaw :).

works well for us!

- --AM


Date: Thu, 08 Nov 2001 07:49:55 -0800
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
From: Anne-Marie Rousseau <acrouss at gte.net>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Medieval cooking for non-cooks

Hey all from Anne-Marie

Solveig discusses the inappropriate nature of the potluck.

I would suggest, however, that a potluck serves several functions:

1. when strapped for cash, students in student housing can often trade in
meal punches for foodstuffs. I did this for years, in some cases, bringing
raw ingredients like rice, etc for other people to cook, and in some cases
bring loaves of bread, cheese, even roast chickens.

2. part of the medieval experience is learning new things. A potluck allows
everyone the opportunity to learn something new. An assigned potluck (ie
"you bring this recipe and you bring this recipe") provides this
opportunity as well as guarenteeing that the food that shows up will be
medieval.

3. Not all potlucks involve a buffet line. Out here we often do served
potlucks. Folks bring food and drop it off at the kitchen. A handful of
skilled volunteers :) prep and dish up the food and then serve it to the
assembled throngs. Its actually more medieval in some ways as not everyone
gets every dish.

4. As an impoverished student, you may not be willing to pay $5 for a feast
ticket. As a not so impoverished university employee, you may be willing to
pay more. A potluck allows people to spend what they can without the
stigma. Broke? pick a cheap recipe. Feeling flush? bring a main dish
object. This is how we do it in our household and it works great.

please dont disuade a group of new people from trying something they've
never done before. The fact that they're playing with medieval recipes is a
great start and I for one am delighted, no matter how they organize it.

--Anne-Marie, who started out doing assigned potlucks in college and
graduated to full feasts within a couple years :).


Date: Thu, 8 Nov 2001 10:11:20 -0800 (PST)
From: Ginny Claphan <mizginny at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Medieval cooking for non-cooks
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org

We host a Yuletime potluck in our march (Tirnewydd). During the day, we have a set amount of tokens that we receive at the gate to be used for gaming or what have you. We also received *extra* tokens for bringing a period dish our persona would have eaten. At the end of the day, the tokens are used to determine the order of precedence in the Gift battle. It worked out nicely last year.

Tirnewydd is also blessed with a pack of enlightened foodies so we eat *very* well.

My hubby Sartaq, who at the time was an expert at the Mac & cheese dish and has since improved, took a receipt from Soup for the Qan which was essentially a lamb, rice, and garlic stew. Turned out to quite tasty and we brought home an empty dish. I made a marzipan shield with the arms of the barony to which our march belongs (Middle Marches - blessedly simple, argent a chevron inverted gules, in chief a laurel wreath vert. :))

Gwyneth


Date: Fri, 09 Nov 2001 07:28:40 -0500
From: johnna holloway <johnna at sitka.engin.umich.edu>
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] pot lucks

Stefan li Rous wrote:
> While not period, I like pot lucks because they can be used to
> encourage folks to try period foods.
--------------------------------------------
I would like to comment that the term pot-luck is within
the timeframe of interest for the Society.
OED lists :
'pot-'luck. One's luck or chance as to what may be
 in the pot, i.e. cooked for a meal: used in
reference to a person accepting another's hospitality
at a meal without any special preparation having been
 made for him;

The earliest quote:
1592 Nashe Four Lett. Confut. Ded., That that
 pure sanguine complexion of yours may never be famisht with pot
     lucke.

Johnnae llyn Lewis  Johnna Holloway


From: ThoraOdottir at aol.com
Date: April 16, 2004 9:19:41 AM CDT
To: ansteorra at ansteorra.org, dragonsfire-tor at ansteorra.org, elfsea at ansteorra.org, loch-ruadh at ansteorra.org
Cc: Subject: [Ansteorra] 6 Simple Rules for a Happy Pot Luck

Greetings to the Populace of our fair Kingdom attending Guardian of the Tor,

It was brought up to me that some rules for the pot luck need to be set down 
to ensure that everyone has the most enjoyable dinner possible that evening.

As this combined pot luck is rather a new thing for a lot of people, here we 
go.

1) If you expect to eat at the pot luck, you are expected to bring items 
    for it (food, cleaning supplies, labor, etc.)  It is not a free feast 
    for noncontributers. Even the poorest members can bring some bread 
    or a couple of gallons of bottled water.
    Otherwise, you are on your own for this meal.

2) Contributions to the potluck should be prepared in order to feed 10.  
    10 Ansteorrans with large appetites from a hard fought combat, work,
    or general enjoyment of the event.
    
3) People supplying food need to remember to bring serving ware (spoons, 
    forks, knives) as needed for their dishe(s). These are often forgotten.
    Remember them.

4) You need to remove leftovers/etc when the meal is done, so the 
    tables and such can be cleaned. 

5) If you wish to ask someone for some of the leftovers of a dish you 
especially enjoyed, 
     make sure you have brought some ziplock bags of your own.

6) You are responsible for cleaning up after yourselves.

Most of all enjoy yourselves.   Following these simple rules will allow all 
of us to enjoy ourselves and each others company.

Bon Appetite,

Thora Olafsdottir
Dragon's Fire Tor


Date: Wed, 06 May 2009 20:26:26 -0400
From: Johnna Holloway <johnnae at mac.com>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Potluck was I is in teh East Kingdom!
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>

Potluck goes back to Elizabethan England
One's luck or chance with regard to what may be in the pot (i.e. cooked 
and available to eat), used originally and chiefly in reference to a 
person's accepting another's hospitality at a meal without any special 
preparation having been made.
*1592* T. NASHE 
<http://dictionary.oed.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/help/bib/oed2-n.html#t-nashe> 
/Strange Newes/ Ep. Ded. sig. A2, That, that pure sanguine complexion of 
yours may neuer be famisht with potte-lucke. **

Johnnae


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