It's not just potluck anymore…

November 16th Menu

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Every week our menus are created to appeal to a wide variety of needs and tastes.  For the last few years we have offered a salad bar with every meal and last year we added gluten-free main dish and dessert options. Karla made this week’s menu with the kids in mind, and for the kid hiding inside every grown-up who secretly yearns for mac and cheese and jello every once in awhile.

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Dinner is served from 4:45-6:15pm.  All are welcome!

Chicken Strips with Dipping Sauces

Macaroni and Cheese

Steamed Broccoli

Red and Orange Jello

Salad Bar

Rice Krispie Treats and Double Chocolate Cookies

 

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Chicken Fried Steak Dinner 11-9-16

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After this crazy election season, we all could use a little comfort food.  Come on down to Calvary Lutheran Church on Wednesday, post-election day, for a little TLC.  Stay for worship at 6:30 after dinner if you’d like.  The music is always exceptionally good, sometimes the puppets come out, and the message of God’s love and grace is there for all.  We are the family of God, and as Nora Ephron once said, “A family is a group of people who eat the same thing for dinner.”  All are welcome at our table.img_2167

Last week we served dinner to over 400 with a baked potato bar, including chili, steamed broccoli, ham, bacon, cheese sauce, homemade cornbread muffins, and a decadent chocolate caramel cake for dessert. Here are a few photos from last week:

Chocolate Caramel Cake

Serves 40, Makes one 12x18x2 inch pan, cut 5×8.

Make recipe 8 times for 320 pieces. (Total for 8 cakes in parentheses)

 

(16 pkg)  2 pkg Pillsbury devil’s food cake mix

(48 eggs)  6 eggs

(8 cups)  1 cup vegetable oil

(8 cans) 1 can sweetened condensed milk

(96 oz)  12 oz caramel ice cream topping

(96 oz)  12 oz chocolate ice cream topping

16 oz Prepared chocolate frosting or 16 oz container cool whip

 

Bake cakes in 12x18x2 inch pans according to package directions.  Remove from oven and immediately punch holes in it with the handle of a wooden spoon.  Mix caramel topping with sweetened condensed milk in saucepan over low heat, stirring until smooth and blended.  While cake is hot, pour caramel mixture over the entire surface. Top with chocolate sauce.  Refrigerate.  When ready to serve, spread with chocolate frosting or cool whip.

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Menu for Nov. 2, 2016

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Wednesday Evening Meal

Calvary Lutheran Church

4:45 – 6:15 pm  All are Welcome!

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Loaded Baked Potato Bar with Assorted Toppings

Salad Bar and Corn Bread Muffins

Chocolate and Caramel Cake

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Cornbread Dressing for a Crowd

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Cornbread Dressing:  Serves 500

60 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (about 15#)

Make 14 9×13 pans cornbread (recipe below)

12 pounds day-old white bread, torn into small pieces

1 1/2 pounds butter or margarine

8 pounds chopped onions

4 bunches celery, chopped

5 50oz cans  cream of chicken soup

7 ½ TBSP poultry seasoning

5 tbsp garlic powder

5 tbsp ground black pepper

7 ½   dozen eggs, beaten

8 50 oz cans chicken broth

 

Boil chicken breasts in large stockpot (may add some large pieces of carrots and celery) until meat is tender.  Strain and reserve chicken broth.  Shred chicken and set aside.

Make cornbread.  When cool, crumble and mix with the white bread crumbs.  Divide into 5 equal batches.

Melt butter or margarine and sauté chopped onions and celery until tender.

For each of the 5 batches, add 1 can cream of chicken soup, 1 ½ TBSP poultry seasoning, 1 TBSP garlic powder, 1 TBSP pepper, 18 eggs.

Add Onions and Celery mixture, evenly divided between the 5 batches.

Add shredded chicken, evenly divided between the 5 batches.

Add reserved broth from boiled chicken,  then add more canned broth as needed to attain desired consistency.  (About 6 quarts chicken broth from boiling chicken, and 7 or 8 cans of broth).  Dressing should be very moist before cooking. Transfer to half or full size disposable steamtable pans.   Bake at 350 degrees convection setting for 1 ½ to 2 hours covered, or until golden brown and hot throughout. Uncover for last 15 minutes to brown top.

Cornbread:  336 servings

Makes  14  9 x 13 pans:  Cut each pan 4×6 for 24 servings (336 total)

This recipe makes 7 9×13 pans.  Make recipe 2 times for 14 pans to make the dressing.

14 cups flour

10 1/2 cups yellow cornmeal

14 TBSP baking powder

3 ½ TBSP salt

28 eggs, beaten

14 cups milk

3 ½ cups melted shortening

 

Preheat oven to 400*.  Grease glass 9×13 and metal cake pans well with shortening.

Mix together dry ingredients.  In another bowl combine eggs and milk, then combine with the dry ingredients, mixing just until moistened.  Stir in the melted shortening.  Divide batter into the pans.

Bake about 20 minutes or until light brown.

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Sweet Potato Casserole for a Crowd

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It’s that time of year when we start craving those Thanksgiving comfort foods.  If you need to make a big batch of sweet potatoes for your church supper, this is how we do it. You can add pecans in the topping if you’re not worried about nut allergies in your crowd. Here’s a previous blog post for Sweet Potatoes for 6 servings and for 300 servings: Sweet Potatoes  Below is the recipe for 400 servings as requested by a reader today.IMG_2629

 

 

Sweet Potato Casserole  400 servings

16  half size disposable pans, ½ cup per serving, approx 25 servings per pan

Total Ingredients:

175 cups mashed sweet potatoes (160# sweet potatoes, baked)

18 ¾  cups brown sugar

100 eggs lightly beaten (8 dozen plus 4)

20 TBSP vanilla

16 cups whole milk (or more if needed)

6 ¼ #  melted butter

 

Divide total above into 5 batches to combine in mixer.  Beat until smooth.

35 cups sweet potatoes

3 ¾  cups brown sugar

20 eggs, lightly beaten

4 TBSP vanilla

3 ¼  cups whole milk

1 ¼ # melted butter

 

Pour into a buttered  pans.  Bake at 325 for 45 min or until hot.   Mix topping ingredients together and sprinkle over top.  Bake an additional 30 minutes to brown.

Topping ingredients for all 16 pans:  (Add after 45 min of cooking so top doesn’t burn) Divide evenly over all pans.

10 cups brown sugar

5 cup flour

2# melted butter

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Side Dish Recipes, Uncategorized

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Menu for October 19th, 2016

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Chicken Alfredo Lasagna, Green Beans, Bread Sticks, Salad Bar, and Peaches & Cream Dessert

Dinner is served from 4:45-6:15 pm, followed by the Worship Service at 6:30.

Suggested donation for the meal is $5 for adults and $3 for children under 12

Our Mission Statement at Calvary Lutheran Church is

Equipped to Go!  Love, Serve and Be the People of God!

Please join us for fellowship and worship, and if you’d like to help serve the people of God, you can volunteer in the kitchen and dining room any or every Tuesday morning or Wednesday afternoon and evening. Stop by the kitchen to sign up or call the office at 342-9043 and ask for Karla.IMG_2753

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The Making of a Church Supper

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On September 28th, we served about 500 people a meal of pasta, meatballs and marinara sauce, a salad bar, garlic bread and garlic knot rolls, and homemade cookies for dessert.  Pre-cooked, frozen meatballs, are browned in the oven and then mixed with Sysco’s deluxe marinara sauce.

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Lots of delicious greens are tossed together for the salad bar.

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Frozen prepared garlic toast is loaded onto full size sheet pans, ready for the oven just before dinnertime.

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Garlic knot rolls are made with by rolling pizza dough into knots, spraying with garlic mist and sprinkling with kosher salt and parmesan cheese before baking.

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75 pounds of rotini noodles were cooked on Tuesday morning, rinsed in cold water and tossed with olive oil, refrigerated overnight, then boiled for 90 seconds just before serving to rewarm them.

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100 dozen homemade cookies were baked on Tuesday morning.

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And most importantly, you need good help at the end of the night for clean-up

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The next week we served Johnsonville Beer Brats and hotdogs (pre-cooked, browned up on the grill), homemade warm German potato salad, a salad bar and chips.

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Pre-made pie crust sheets were filled with apple pie filling and rolled up, sprinkled with cinnamon sugar and baked to make apple strudel.

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3 different kinds of kuchen were delivered to us by Pietz’s Kuchen Kitchen in Scotland, SD for a special authentic German treat.img_2025

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Roast Beef Dinner, October 12, 2016

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On the menu tomorrow night at Calvary Lutheran Church:

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Roast Beef, Au gratin Potatoes, Peas & Carrots, Dinner Rolls, Salad Bar, and Cherry Crisp

Dinner is served from 4:45-6:15pm, followed by worship at 6:30.

All are welcome!

 

 

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Octoberfest Menu 10-5-16

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Fall has arrived in the beautiful Black Hills of South Dakota!

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Let’s celebrate the season together with an Octoberfest meal at Calvary Lutheran Church tomorrow night, October 5th from 4:45 to 6:15 pm.  We’re serving up Bratwurst and Hot Dogs, Hot German Potato Salad along with our regular Salad Bar, and Kuchen and Strudel.

All are welcome, members and visitors alike. We ask for a suggested donation of $5 for adults and $3 for children under 12, but anything you can contribute to help pay for the cost of providing meals every Wednesday is much appreciated.

Join us after supper each Wednesday for a contemporary worship service at 6:30 in the sanctuary.

We’d also like to invite anyone with an interest in cooking or serving to please contact Karla and sign up. You can reach her by email at karla@calvaryrapidcity.org, by calling the church office at 342-9043, or just signing up on the volunteer form at the Welcome Center in the narthex. You’ll meet new people and make new friends as you get involved in this very rewarding ministry of our church.  We need help cooking on Tuesday mornings from 9:30-noon and on Wednesdays from 1pm on.  No experience necessary!

 

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Italian Dinner 9-28-16

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Last week we had a full house of 560 for our chicken dinner.  We served 1000 pieces of chicken from Pizza Ranch, and we’re sorry if anyone had to wait a little for the chicken to arrive.  We were amazed at how fast they were able to cook up an extra hundred pieces and get it delivered before the end of dinner service. Here are a few snaps from the dining room on Wednesday night:

Salad bar ingredients, prepped and ready.
Kids love drumsticks and baby carrots.
The salad bar looks great tonight.
It’s drumsticks for Larry!
Volunteer servers are always appreciated. Sign up at the welcome table if you want a turn.
Fresh homemade banana cake with cream cheese frosting.
Ready for action. 4 serving lines loaded and ready to go
We love these cheerful faces!
An easy night for the cooks with Pizza Ranch cooking our main dish tonight.
Broccoli salad for a crowd
Chicken ranch, it tastes so good
Kitchen helpers love selfies.
Music teachers and Mitch get an early start on dinner.
Our awesome piano accompanist and dinner buddy enjoy their chicken before the crowd gets here.

This week we’ll be having an Italian Dinner of rotini pasta with spaghetti sauce and meatballs, caesar salad bar, fruit salad, garlic knot rolls, and homemade cookies for dessert.

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Dinner starts at 4:45 pm and ends at 6:15 pm.  Worship begins at 6:30, with a special presentation of Bibles to our 3rd graders in the Milestone Celebration.  We hope you can join us to celebrate with them and their families.

BANANA CAKE for a Crowd with Cream Cheese Frosting

Here’s the recipe for the banana cake we made this week.  This recipe makes 5 9×13 size cakes, cut into 24 pieces per cake.  We made the recipe 5 times for a total of 600 pieces of cake, using 12 1/2 pans (12x20x2 inch size plus 1 9×13 pan).

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16 1/4 cups flour

2 1/2 Tablespoons baking soda

2 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 pound plus 14 ounces unsalted butter, at room temperature

10 cups sugar

15 large eggs

10 cups mashed ripe bananas

3 Tablespoons vanilla

7 1/2 cups buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350*. Grease bottom and sides of cake pans.

Sift or whisk together dry ingredients in a large bowl.

In large mixer bowl, beat butter until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add sugar, beat until smooth.

Add eggs, mix well, then add in bananas and vanilla. Mix until combined.

Add half the flour mixture, beating on low just until incorporated, about 1 minute.  Add buttermilk, beat about 15 seconds.  Add remaining flour, beat just until combined, scraping bottom as needed.

Pour cake into cake pans. Batter should be about halfway up sides of pans.

Bake for 40-45 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking.

Cool cakes completely before frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting for 12 1/2 cakes (12x20x2 inch). We divided this into 2 batches in our large Berkel mixer.

5 pounds butter, softened

10 pounds cream cheese, softened

7 Tablespoons vanilla

18 pounds powdered sugar

Beat together butter and cream cheese until well blended.  Beat in vanilla, then slowly add powdered sugar, blending well after each addition.

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