madbaker | Snoggy Investiture (better than smoggy) (Reply)

I had fun. I thought

ldyanna's Laurel elevation went well (even if I jumped script and released her as my apprentice early). The household looked good in their matching livery.

Having two halls with A/C made the day comfortable. I didn't spend more than a couple minutes outside at any point so I was quite comfortable in my linens.

The feast was good. Not one of my top five attended, but good and worthwhile, certainly better than a couple feasts I've run. Some of the individual dishes were outstanding - the ginger baked apples and the fried cheese curds especially. Our table sat there and debated what would make some of the dishes even better, such as lavender honey on the fried cheese. That's what you get with me, the wife,

j_i_m_r, and

roswtr sitting together. Congrats to roswtr on getting her 2nd QOG! I could see Their Majesties looking in our direction as the ceremony opened, and I figured it wasn't me and JIMR already has one...

I still woke up at 5:30 this morning, so I'm dragging today. In lieu of more recap here's what I wrote for my spokespeech.

[geezer voice] You young whippersnappers don't know what a bad feast is.[/geezer]

And that's a good thing. In the last ten to fifteen years period cooking in the West Kingdom has progressed amazingly far – especially feast cooking. I never experienced that many bad feasts years ago; but really, it's pretty rare now.

When the general level of cooking has risen that much higher across the Kingdom, how does a cook stand out?

Well, there's the way that Anna de Serra did it.

Her feasts are marvels: the food is extremely tasty, of course. There's the breadth that she’s researched: English and French, Catalonian, Italian, and more. And diners can feast their eyes on her beautiful subtleties.

But Anna also has used her cooking to teach the populace: she has cooked several feasts that were not just from one geographical area, or even from the same medieval cookbook – but adapted from a single feast menu in that period book.

And Anna's cooking is not limited to feasts. She has helped the Principality learn cooking as the Copper Spoon minister. She was one of the primary forces behind the dayboards offered at wars the past couple of years – and the food was all documented to period. She entered every single Wooden Spoon competition one year – and won half of them!

In short, Anna de Serra has been a huge factor in raising the standards of cooking in this Kingdom to one of the highest in the Known World. I look forward to learning more from Anna as we welcome her as our Peer.

The first line got a big laugh, as I intended. Get their attention with humor and they'll stay sucked in.

Anna gave me a chocolate-covered bacon bar (as well as other things) as a thank you. I'm intrigued. Hmm, I guess this tag will get retired for a while.

What I'm reading: Ilona Andrews, Magic Burns