by Angie "Phoenix" Gray
What did you miss at Feast of Grimloch you ask?? Me in my crown. See??
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| Photo provided by Jason Gray |
You also missed seeing many other amazing people and really, those are two of the key things that make a feast great aren’t they? Dressing fancy and being in good company.
As we arrived, I was excited to see that the guest weren’t the only things looking fancy. The feast hall was aglow with magical strings of light. It was a large venue with plenty of room for a crowd.
Entering the first site was wares from the Bronze Forge laid out for purchase. They seemed to be both high quality and reasonable prices. We picked up some new arrows to try out.
The evening as a whole was a good break from odd strangers showing up among us, and random unexpected attacks. I spent the majority of the evening playing cards with a unique and innovative chip set composed of tiny containers of various foodstuff. Other activities including throwing bean bags at a holes, a mixology contest (won by Sir Tao who let me try a sip of his concoction so I can attest it truly was worthy), and Grimloch’s shank and bail. For those that don’t know it is an obstacle course like race, which also involves combatants, jumping out to avoid or kill.
Along with the multiple planned activities, as always people were making their own fun. For example, Vanduke and Evie bopped along, for a bit, doing something that was either a dance or animal imitation, among the groups of people sharing conversation and comradery.
While I mentioned two of the key things that make a feast great, I’d be very remiss if I didn’t talk about the third essential component of a good feast- the food!! Empress Katasha was my kitchen slave master’s mentor’s mentor and has been someone whose cooking expertise I’ve admired for over two decades. The quality of the offerings didn’t disappoint.
We started out with a nacho bar, which included tasty things like spicy chicken, salsa, sour cream, and jalapenos to load on to our chips in proportions that best suited our taste. Next up was a variety of flat breads loaded with flavor. The buffalo chicken one was one of my two favorite dishes of the night. Following that was beef pho served up by Sir Blade and Sir PJ. For the uninitiated, you cover thinly sliced high quality beef, rice noodles, and sprouts with an amazing bone broth and add spices to suit your taste. The broth cooks the other ingredients.
The main course was balsamic pork tenderloin accompanied by spinach artichoke potatoes and brown butter broccoli.
I must confess that I have a tiny sweet tooth and regularly skip desert post stuffing myself with other offerings. That was the case here too so I have no firsthand knowledge of it but have been told the meal concluded with whoopie pies in a multitude of flavors- classic, pumpkin, and cider followed by apple dumplings.
In short it was a wonderful to have Katasha cooking for the Realms again, the food was excellent, our host were gracious and the company was good.