Link to original google doc. - March 2023

Featherstone Kitchen - A Short Guide by Paris

⚖︎ For happy healthy fae, living on a happy healthy planet

Some of the things I did, didn’t do and would want to do if I did it again! The possibilities are endless, there’s no right or wrong way to do things, but most importantly...  a happy, flowing kitchen is co-created with love, kindness and care (..and be kind to yourself if you’re feeling a little off-balance and happen to forget this one important thing..)

I hope others will find this guide useful, if not long. Please add to it and edit it, as if it were your own - it belongs to all of us.

Paris

🥦 Fruit & Vegetables

• We bought our veg from a wholesaler in Carlisle, but speaking to other fae that have run the kitchen in the past, Billy Bells in Haltwhistle may work out better. Speaking to them, they say you can place orders up to a week before delivery and make changes up to a couple of days before.
• In the moot we said we’d aim to buy more local and seasonal produce - it’s cheaper, tastier and probably needs less chemicals to grow/store. They’re also less likely to be wrapped in plastic.
• You can put a call out for home grown vegetables too - fae have brought their own produce in the past :)
• The recommended portion size for fruit and vegetables is 500 grams a day, so 200-250 grams per meal - this is helpful for calculating orders as well as portion sizes in the castle. This is separate from carb portion sizes (potato, squash etc).
• We put a few big boxes of fruit in the upstairs wash up area (next to the daily schedule) - I would bring a few bowls down to the kitchen before breakfast each day, but this wasn’t always easy to remember - perhaps there’s a better place for them :)
• The order spreadsheet estimates the portion size per vegetable (link tbc) - this is a rough estimate and would reduce as you increase the number of different vegetables in a dish. It’s just a guide to give you an overall estimate of the number of kilograms you need which will then help decide how many standard size cases (or half size cases) you want to order. It’s an art not a science.
• The fancy veg tends to get used up first, leaving lots of swedes, potatoes and onions etc. towards the end of the week. It’s worth mentioning this to the lead cook before they come up with their recipe and asking them to be mindful in their usage.
• It may help to hang a sign in the veg pantry with some guidance on the above (written in verse if poss..) - “please use veg that’s turning first and please try to balance ‘fancy’ veg with the stodgy cheaper stuff so we’re not eating swede soup on the last day” also a guide on veg portion sizes that’s easy to understand - a potential creative project..

🧑🏽‍🍳 Cooking tips

• Add asofaetida to beans when soaking and kelp when cooking - this helps break down the hard to digest bits.