Way of Love Festival 2012: cooking for nearly 100 people!

Large plastic tubs used for serving

I'm back! And desperately trying to catch up with all the lovely blog posts from my friends I have missed in the last week. Where was I?-Well, I was assisting my husband in catering for the guests at our Way of Love Hare Krishna Festival last weekend (as well as running around like crazy trying to look after everyone and get other jobs done...!) I thought it might be interesting to post a few pictures of that experience.

Servers laid out plates and cups in rows on the floor as everyone sat down

As the arati lamp is carried through to the kitchen, the kids get to tuck in early!

My husband surrenders to the challenges of a kitchen with only two large burners, no oven and  a tiny fridge!

We made the entire catering vegan, and so everyone was satisfied with that. We served three meals a day, at 8:00am- 10:00am, 1:00pm, and 8:00pm. The whole process began with deciding what to cook for all of the days. Dry goods we got by wholesale order. Breakfast was pumpernickel with jam and organic sugar-free peanut butter, cornflakes or muesli with soya milk and fruit. We also had a large tea-urn on the go all day so that guests could help themselves to Barleycup and herbal teas. (Keeping that area clean and tidy was a full-time occupation in itself!) For lunches we served things like hummus, salad and pitta bread, soup or pasta with soya chunks in tomato sauce. My husband either made fruit salad with cashew cream or I made sweets from dried fruit, nut butter and/ or carob and coconut in various combinations. Without our Magimix, we would have been stuck! Dinners were more traditional; usually sabji rice and dal and a sweet or cake.

You may think I'm taking a well-earned rest now after all that, but no! I have bravely (Or foolishly!) agreed to take part in a concert of Indian-jazz fusion music in 2 weeks' time, playing the tampura. I never played it before, so I have to learn quick! And a cookbook, "Kitchen of Love", including some of our recipes will be published very soon, (I'll post about this once it's published), so I'm busy with deadlines for that.... I will, however, try to keep up with posting here during that time, though maybe not as often, so please bear with me.