Secrets from the Kitchen: Sacred Heart Will Serve 1,000 at Sunday Luncheon
What does it take to serve 1,000 adults and children a delicious chicken and dumpling family style meal with fresh homemade slaw, buttered corn, green beans like grandma made with bacon and onions, and fantastic homemade desserts? It all starts at 5:00 a.m. Sunday morning when 30 Sacred Heart parishioners begin "Rollin with the Lard"….Yes, the secret ingredient for the much sought after recipe that originally belonged to parishioner Tillie Parks and used every year for the annual chicken and dumpling dinner is LARD. 30 pounds of fresh lard.
"That's fresh lard right from Fred Gajewski's Meat Processing. It just makes them (dumplings) richer." says head cook Suzanne Majewski. "You could use oil, but they won't be as good."
According to Majewski, 9 gallons of whole milk, 32 ounces of baking powder, and a pound of Morton salt and 200 pounds of flour….."That's sifted flour, not just out of the bag and into the measuring cup. Sifting makes dumplings lighter. The amount of flour really depends on the weather that day. If it is a humid day, it takes more flour to roll…you don't want them sticky and hard. We would like a dry day for lighter dough and less flour."
Another main ingredient are the 24 dozen eggs. "We get eggs that are "free range" fresh eggs. The chickens are in a loose yard where they can eat grass and natural food. That gives the eggs a dark yellow yolk which you definitely want for dumplings. Caged chickens get seed supplements…..you get a thin shell and pale yolk." says Majewski.
230 pounds of chicken thighs are bought, cooked, and deboned by Liz Wynn and her kitchen crew to make gallons of rich yellow broth, seasoned just right with onion, celery…….and a few secrets ingredients; but they are all natural. "We don't use any of that yellow, flavored powder for color. We use real cooked chicken broth cooked right here (Haffner Hall)."
Event director and coordinator Linda Sherman says that preparation and committees actually begin work in early August, but the actual dinner day starts at 5:00 a.m. where parishioners go to their assigned table to begin the long hours of sifting, measuring, beating, rolling and cutting and ends about 5:00 p.m. after clean up.
"Organization is the name of the game," says Sherman. It is an assembly-line with 30 people."
The flour-sifter has to be speedy to get that measured flour to the egg and milk group who has already cracked and measured the exact recipe amount. One egg is beaten to give volume before you add the half-cup of milk which then is added to the flour which has been measured and leveled off with a knife.
"You can't pack it in a measuring cup…it makes hard dumplings." says Majewski. "Then you cut lard in with a fork or pastry blender. 288 dough balls or batches are made; the balls are divided into 3 smaller ones and given to the rollers who roll the pastry ¼ to 1/8 inches thin. "Not too thick and not too thin; just right." They are then cut into strips with a pizza cutter or scallop wheel.
Then the kitchen crew gathers the dumplings to be dropped into the boiling golden broth. By 11:00 a.m. the doors are open and people are gathering in the dining area, lured by the tantalizing aroma of a homemade meal. Neither Sherman nor Majewski can remember ever running out of dumplings or desserts.
"We usually make too much and sell what we have left…we never run out." says Majewski. Sherman says the dish washers come in the week before to wash the china dishes and utensils. "The table servers make sure everyone has drinks, full bowls of food on the table, a pie or cake for dessert, and a lot of hospitality." says Sherman. "No one should go away hungry and you don't have to leave a tip."
"It is a long day," says Fr. Nick Junker, pastor of Sacred Heart, "but it is a wonderful opportunity for our parish, young and old, to work together. We send out invitations to our community and area churches encouraging them to come. We like to think of it as a community fall festival. The main ingredient is…fellowship."
This year's dinner will be held on Sunday, Oct. 21 from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Tickets are $9 for adults and $5 for children 6 and older; 5 and under are free. Tickets can be purchased at the door or from parishioners.
--Our Appreciation to Doris Rottschalk