Classics Department Picnic
From CarlWiki
The Classics Department Picnic is an event that has taken place during Spring Term for the last several years. The event typically features the spit-roasting of an animal, such as a lamb, in honor of ancient Mediterranean feasts. In the 2004-2005 school year, a marathon reading of Homer accompanied the day-long roasting.
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History of the Classics Department Picnic
- Prior to 1996: It is not known whether picnics were held before this year.
- 1996: A pig was roasted in the Arb at the Druid Circle in 1996.
- 1997-2003: Picnics were held periodically, but the history of these picnics is unknown.
- 2003: Picnic hosted in the Arb at the Druid Circle. A lamb was roasted on a spit made of wood found in the Arb.
- 2005: Picnic held on Mai Fete Island. A lamb was roasted by William Richter '05 and Scott Konzem '06 on a metal spit welded together by Steve Harris '06.
- 2006: Picnic held on Mai Fete Island. A lamb was seasoned by Scott Konzem '06 and Sarah Beckmann '07 and roasted, with many classics enthusiasts involved.
In 2005 and 2006, the picnic occurred on the same day as the Intergalactic Super-Heroes Super-Villains Convention.
How to Host the Classics Department Picnic
The following instructions were originally put together by William Richter '05, based on the experience of the 2004-2005 barbecue.
Preliminaries
Reserve a location for the picnic early in spring term (they can go fast). Mai Fete worked great, but wherever you hold it, contact the facilities scheduler Stephanie Huston for reservations (shuston@acs.carleton.edu, x7185).
Order the lamb 2-3 weeks in advance of the picnic. We called Bonnie and Joe Austin at (507) 352-4441. They sold us a 60 lb lamb for $205. They can tell you about delivery/pickup options. Usually you can get it delivered for free.
Pass around signup sheets in class about 10 days before the picnic. I think Jean has forms the professors can hand out, but make sure people indicate their feelings towards meat. We invited everyone in all the classics courses and had about 55 sign up. These signup sheets then need to be given to the food service manager Peter Barnett who will prepare pack-out meals. (pbarnett@acs.carleton.edu, x7107). We told him that we didn’t want any meat (hamburgers, hotdogs are included in pack-out meals), so they compensated with extra drinks and this alarmingly yellow potato salad. You might be able to cut a better deal. Also, we didn’t order meals for the people who were off-board since it was pretty expensive, but we still had plenty of stuff to go around.
When you’re talking to Peter, ask him if you can store the lamb in the Burton coolers for a few days. They aren’t too happy about the idea, but they’ve said yes the last two times.
A few days before the picnic, pick up a tax-exempt letter from Jean before you do your shopping. The business office won’t reimburse sales tax I don’t think.
Preparing the Lamb
Get a good night’s sleep the night before because you’ll want to get up early. We marinated the lamb for a couple hours before cooking it and it was delicious. I wouldn’t recommend more than three hours since you won’t be able to keep it cold. If you decide to marinate it, pick it up as early as you can, (7:00 or 8:00). First, score the fat along the outside at 1-inch intervals. Then we rubbed it down with about ½ liter of olive oil, a package each of fresh rosemary and thyme, two bunches of Italian parsley, some pepper and two heads of garlic as well as the juice of two or three lemons which we added during the last hour or so of marinating. This recipe is just a suggestion, of course; feel free to innovate. The marinating process can be kind of messy, so you might consider doing it outside.
After a few hours of marinating, put it on the spit, which should probably be cleaned thoroughly. Once it’s on the spit, push the skewers into the lamb, one on each side. We put the front skewer through its neck (you have to push kind of hard) and forelegs, in other words, vertically if the lamb were standing up). The skewer on the rear end didn’t really do much, but luckily the lamb stayed securely on the spit. You might want to consider a smaller separation between the two prongs of the rear skewer.
Once the skewers are in place, you have to tie the spine to the spit. To do this, reach inside the cavity and make a pair of incisions on each side of the spine with a narrow knife. Thread a piece of twine trough one hole, around the spit (there will be an inch or two gap between the spine and the spit) and then back out the other side around the spine and then tie a knot. Repeat this procedure in three more places along the spine.
We then tied the legs together and pulled them as close to the spit as we could and then tied the feet to the spit (the legs weren’t very flexible, so we couldn’t get them that close to the spit). We also tied a piece of string around the body cavity, but I don’t know if this had much effect.
About an hour before you want to start cooking (while the lamb’s marinating), prepare the fire pit. I would suggest digging a shallow (6-8” deep) pit that is about half again as long as the lamb and three times as wide. Use 30-40 lbs of charcoal to start
Once the fire is hot, spread the coals out into two piles, one that will be under the lamb’s head, one under its feet, but preferable not in a way that lots of juices will be dripping into the fire. You don’t need coals in the middle because the ribs are thin and cook very quickly.
Now you just have to put it over the fire and let it cook. To start out with, we had it on the lowest rung of the supports and we moved it up about 2½ hours into the cooking, but you will need to trust your instincts. With our fire, you could hold your hand at the level of cooking for 5-7 seconds. Once the lamb is in place, put a large pan underneath it to catch the drippings. We had hopes of making a jus, but they didn’t really work. If you want to try to do something with the drippings, be sure to empty the pan into a (very) heat resistant container frequently so the fat doesn’t scorch and so you don’t get too much ash in the pan. Even if you don’t want to save the drippings, you should have the pan there to avoid a large-scale oil fire that could, I’m told, lead to the whole thing going up in flames, which would be a huge bummer.
At this point your job is pretty repetitive. A sixty pound lam will take about eight hours to cook- Every 15-20 minutes turn it ¼ revolution. If the spit won’t stay in a given position, tie a rope to the end of the crank and stake it in the ground. I think Chico has stakes you could use. When the lamb is getting close to done, you might vary the turning slightly because some parts will inevitably get done before others.
We also basted it with lemon juice and olive oil every so often. You’ll need about a liter of olive oil and a half dozen lemons or so to do this.
You should add about 15 pounds of charcoal to the fire each hour, preferably not all at once. What we did was to add a couple handfuls of briquettes each time all the coals became totally ashed over. Basically, you want there to be some unburned (black) charcoal on the fire all the time. We went through about 140 lbs of charcoal, including the stuff we used for the grill
Check the temperature periodically. We used an instant read electric thermometer, which was very convenient, but an ordinary meat thermometer would get the job done. The target temperature is between 135-140, but some parts will inevitably get warmer than that, which is fine because apparently some people like well-done meat. Also, since the lamb exposed to the heat unevenly, you’ll never reach a point where the whole thing is 140 degrees at the same time, but as long as a given piece of meat reaches that temperature at some point, you’re fine, especially since lots of people like it rare.
If you’re cooking experience mirrors ours, parts of the will be approaching well-doneness while other parts are too rare even for Jackson’s taste. At this point, just start carving. It’s pretty intuitive, but Jackson would be happy to demonstrate. When you get to the stuff that’s too rare to eat, leave it and give it another 15-20 minutes over the fire and then carve off some more.
Other things to consider
Our lamb came without a head or internal organs. I am told that you can make an incomparable delicacy by putting the liver, kidneys and maybe lungs on a spit and then wrapping them in the intestines and then roasting these for a while. I can see no reason why this concoction would be anything less than delectable. I’m not sure if Bonnie and Joe will sell you a lamb with all that stuff in it, but you can ask the folks at Basil’s pizza who are old hands at lamb roasting and can get you a black market lamb with organs intact (Minnesota law prohibits selling lambs with heads or certain organs for fear of disease).
Also, make sure the cooks have some food with them or plans to leave. I sustained myself on red wine and camel lights from about 9 am to 6 pm and by the end of the night I was threatening people at the superhero party with parts of the lamb carcass.
