A Season at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival Comes to a Close

At the Minnesota Renaissance Festival, I perform various cooking demonstrations with my assistants.  In past years, we’ve created a lot of food that needed to fill empty bellies, but we didn’t have the means to do so.  A couple of years ago, we developed a way of performing the cooking demonstrations and feeding the cast.  Last year, we dubbed the concept as The Family Table.

There, cast members could get some hand crafted meals, water, and a place for the community to connect.  We prepared a meat and vegan dish each day.  On a couple of the list serves, that I belong to, I posted some facts about the family kitchen.

• Each day of the 2010 run of the Minnesota Renaissance Festival, The Family Table served between 85-125 people.
• On Saturday, October 2, 2010, we broke a record by serving 122 cast members in 40 minutes (shortest time for service).  We believe it was due to the cold weather.  On Sunday, October 3, 2010, we prepared for the day and fed 185 cast members.
• MRF provides a stipend for a food budget, but following it would allow us to feed the cast through 5th weekend.  The cast’s tips and donations help us stretch the budget to feed the cast throughout the entire season.
• Each week, Cub, Rainbow, Kowalski’s, Lunds, Sam’s Club, and Costco are all shopped to get the best prices
• Every bowl is washed and bleached so that they remain food safe.  At the end of the run, every bowl, cast iron pot, and wooden utensil is oiled and prepped for storage over the winter.
• All of the equipment for The Family Kitchen weighs 1750 lbs and includes two tables, tent, fly, cast iron pots, travel stove, shelving, period kitchen, shelving, coolers, etc.
• I kept a running tally through the season.  We went through a lot of food (roughly):
  Black Beans    14 lbs
  Chickpeas        22 lbs
  Lentils 8 lbs
  Zucchini           100 lbs
  Rice    100 lbs
  Bread     65 lbs
  pumpkins    23 lbs
  leeks    30 lbs
  onions    15 lbs
  potatoes    117 lbs
  carrots    130 lbs
  chicken    140 lbs
  beef    150 lbs
  pork    72 lbs
  meatballs    27 lbs
  kielbasa    30 lbs
  turkey    60 lbs
  mushrooms    16 lbs

  I hope that The Family Table can become a not-for-profit entity for next year.  I am looking for a lawyer who specializes in filing for not-for-profit status in Minnesota and is willing to work pro-bono.  If you have any referrals, please let me know.