Cooking For The Ranch Crew ~ Part 1: The Menu

Does your job include cooking for the ranch crew? Mine does, sometimes. I was not raised on a ranch, cooking for the crew, but I had the blessing of being taught to cook by a mom who was raised Amish. I was raised in a Mennonite home, myself, and let me tell you; a Mennonite Sunday dinner is some of the best food you've ever eaten!

Cooking For The Ranch Crew

Anyways. Here you are, your boss wants you to cook for 12 men and you have no idea what to cook. Let me just say that you better serve beef. If you are on a ranch in the American West, I can almost guarantee they will want beef. Maybe pork will get by, but chicken probably won't. Once our boss bought some fried chicken and put it on the table for a joke. Yep. It's that much of a joke around here! 😀

First, you need a menu. I usually pick a type of beef first, then work around that. A typical menu for me is  something like this:
Beef Roast
Mashed Potatoes
Gravy
Green Beans
Broccoli Salad
Jello Salad
Dinner rolls
Homemade Pies
with ice cream.

Yes, I know that is a lot of food! But these guys are hungry. They usually get up before the sun on these cattle-working days. They catch, saddle and trailer their horses to our ranch. Then they ride out a couple miles, round up and bring in several hundred head of cows, then sort, vaccinate or load them. By lunch, they can put away lots of  food! It is satisfying, really. They don't care if I forget the salt or the potatoes are lumpy. (Or they are just too polite to mention it.) Anyways, I figure two normal serving per person, when I am cooking for the ranch crew.

OK, now go make your menu.
Step 1: Choose your meat. Think of a cut of meat you are comfortable making. I love herbed beef roast, because it can be in the oven on low all night, then you just have to keep it warm till noon. It can sit in there for awhile without causing any damage.

Step 2: Choose your vegetable. Peas, beans, corn, whatever you like.

Step 3: Choose your salad. I like salads that have the dressing already on them, like crunchy broccoli salad or layered lettuce salad, but any salad will work. It likely won't be the star of the show anyways, just sayin'. Don't spend all day on the salad.

Optional step 4: Choose a jello salad. This is entirely up to you, but they will probably like this better than the green salad, ok.

Step 5: Bread. Some kind of bread, whether it is biscuits, extra soft dinner rolls, cornbread, anything. Preferably fresh from the oven.

Step 6: Choose your dessert. Homemade fruit pies, cobblers, cakes, cookies, cheesecakes... they love it all. But be warned; they may take a second (third?) helping of beef instead of dessert. Yes, this happens frequently, and no, I am not offended. That just means me and the kids can pig out be rewarded with the leftovers later.

Have fun making your menu! And I'll be back soon with the cooking help...