Writer's Block Unplugged

Where shall I start? Yule Feast was so long ago that I've forgotten most of it. I remember I did some cooking, I baked bread, and I taught a class on inkle-loom weaving.
I had hoped to go to Kingdom Twelfth Night in January but that didn't happen.

There was Investiture in the middle of February. (For my non-SCA friends, that's when the new Prince and Princess step up to the thrones and the previous Prince and Princess step down.) The original plan was to combine that event with Winter War. I'm so glad that plan didn't work out! The two events are very different and combining them would have been a logistical nightmare. The argument for combining the two was that in the past attendance at Investiture varied from "poor" to "less-than-appropriate-for-a-principality-that-wants-to-be-a-kingdom-soon". Well, what do you expect? Alberta winters do not encourage long-distance travel.

As it turned out, attendance at February Investiture was just fine this year. Perhaps it was because the event was held here in the Barony of Borealis. Not only do we have a large and active group here, we serve up feasts that are worth traveling for!

I am very happy to be part of the Borealis Culinary Guild. Everyone works so well together, and our combined efforts  produce consistently good results. (Our success is due in large part to our "test feasts", which combine experimentation and great fun.) My contribution to this feast was twenty-two meat pies and two gluten-free meat pies, plus of course the fresh-out-of-the-oven bread.

That's what goes into a meat pie: ground beef, egg, dates, cranberries, currants….

Working with the gluten-free pie crust was a challenge!

There they are: regular pie crust on left, the gluten-free at right

The down side of working in the kitchen at an event is that you don't have much time to enjoy the event itself. I was rather busy running back and forth between judging A&S entries and kneading dough! But it was all worth it. Once the food was all served we had some time to relax and socialize….. and to bask in the compliments. Great work, team!

Master Jean de Chauliac -- don't mess with him when he's wielding a knife!

The Honorable Lordship Peregrine Falconer -- he cooks, he cleans, he makes food presentation a work of art!

Mistress Joan the Just -- she uses modern technology to make a period dish of mashed turnips and bacon!