Cinco de Mayo!!! That meant for all of the science party that we were responsible for the Saturday night dinner for the entire ship. Naturally, we chose a menu with Mexican flair.
Never before had any of us had to cook for over 140 people and organize the entire thing. Scott Hiller and Janet Scannell headed the entire endeavor with zeal. Scott had his enchilada recipe, many others added their recipes, and numbers of scientists volunteered for all the various tasks. By 1:30 I made it down to the galley to see already a flurry of activity in there. Everywhere I looked people were equipped with knives and chopping away. Well, almost everybody as you can see in the pictures below.
Group
Ingrid Spies, Liz Labunski, Jay Clark, and Carleton Ray all cut away at the vegetables
while David Hyrenbach is once again playing with his food.
So as the preparations continued in the galley, some serious cooking was going on with the meat that David Hassilev maintained. He was overseeing the chicken, ground beef, flank steak, and pork. He also was the other David in the "Double Dave Chili” that was a great addition to the enchiladas.
David Hassilev
David Hassilev, the grill cook.
The preparations for the dinner continued to move along as lots of green chiles, onions, and tomatoes were added to the dishes. Lots of curious crewmembers seemed to have a reason to come down to the mess deck just to see what type of science experiment was in store for them for dinner. The work seemed to go by quickly and the festive music kept all our spirits up. The tortillas for the enchiladas were precooked just to soften them on the grill and Dylan Righi came to join me in that process. I think overall nearly 150 enchiladas were rolled and served. Maggie and I filled in where we were needed.
Robyn and Maggie
I’m standing behind the serving line and Maggie is got her hands into the fake chicken for all the vegetarians. (Photos Courtesy of Maggie Prevenas and Carol Ladd)
As it neared 4:00PM, we were well on our way to making the deadline of 4:30PM with dinner starting at 5:00PM. We began putting all the food out, including the salad and nacho bar items. The last task was the cooking of the churros for dessert along with the flan that Ana Aguilar-Islas had prepared on Friday night. It looked like a great spread for a Cinco de Mayo dinner.
Double Dave's Chilli
The serving line and a close-up of the churros, enchiladas, and the "Double Daves Chili.”
At 5:00PM we had a line waiting and it was serving time. The food was served with smiling faces and everyone was excited to see what we had done. We got lots and lots of "thank yous” and a whole lot of "that was yummy!” Finally, as 6:00PM came around the serving of dinner was done and the clean up began. There were lots of pans and silverware to be cleaned and the entire galley and mess deck had to be spotless. Everyone was realizing and appreciating all that the cook staff does on a regular basis. Most of us were getting tired from the heat and we only did one of the three meals of the day.
Ray and Kris
Ray Sambrotto and Kris Swenson work on getting the dishes clean. (Photos Courtesy of Ana Aguilar-Islas and Maggie Prevenas)
Overall the dinner was a great success and many of us sit down to some food and fellowship as others clean up. Many of the other scientists were busy cleaning up the galley and the mess deck. It was a real collaborative effort to put on a meal for everyone on the Healy.
Resting and Eating
Many of the scientists and cooks for the day rest and eat after a meal well done.