Remembrance sleepover, batch cooked bolognaise

This weekend heralds Fourth Friern Barnet Guides annual Remembrance Sunday sleepover, seventeen girls and all 4 leaders will be parading on Sunday as part of the local Remembrance service. As I type I imagine (hope) neckers and t-shirts are being ironed, extra layers for under uniform being packed, school shoes being cleaned. And that's just me. 

As the girls are willingly giving up their Sunday to participate in something important, we have a sleepover the night before - we're combining our Confectioners badge with giant jenga, the chocolate game, and making poppy brooches. 

Tomorrow we'll be bag packing in our local Tesco to raise some much needed funds for the unit - we're in desperately in need of our own, lightweight Patrol tents, and other things like new baking equipment, sewing kits and some camp uniform as well as subsiding tickets for Wellies and Wristbands next year. We're hoping that bag packing will help us towards those targets, and we'll also be using the day as as opportunity to raise awareness of Guiding in the local area and with any luck, recruit some new Adult leaders. 

If you've got people being that busy then obviously you're going to need to feed them. We had a Guide chat with the girls on Tuesday and pasta seemed to be the general consensus - most are having it with a traditional bolognaise, some with a vegetarian version of the same, and a couple will have theirs with cheese and butter, but supplement that with carrot & cucumber sticks and cherry tomatoes. 

This meant, that while running a temperature and fighting off a fluey bug I found myself in Asda this afternoon with a list, a trolley and a single minded ambition to get the food for the sleepover sorted. 

In case you're wondering, to make Spaghetti sauces for twenty one people, your shopping list looks like this:

8 tins chopped tomatoes
8 cloves garlic
4 onions
1 large box (750g) mushrooms
12 peppers
12 carrots
Half a butternut squash
1 parsnip
Tomato puree
Oregano
Marmite
2 kg lean minced beef

Vegetarian Bolognaise

Dice 4 carrots, half a butternut squash, parsnip, 4 peppers and about 250g of mushrooms
Blitz 1 onion, 2 sticks of celery and 2 cloves of garlic in a food processor
Add oil to a large pan and heat up gently
Add the onion, celery and garlic and cook gently for about 15 minutes
Add the carrots, butternut squash and parsnip with a splash of water
Put a lid on the pan and let the veggies steam for about 10 minutes
Add the rest of the veggies, stir in and let cook down for 5 - 10 minutes (until the mushrooms start to colour)
Add 2 tins of tomatoes a large sprinkling of dried oregano, a tablespoon of tomato puree and a tsp of marmite
Leave over a low heat for about half an hour until most of the liquid has reduced

After this, I've put the sauce in a large foil tray, let it cool and will reheat in the oven tomorrow. I wouldn't usually use root veg in a bolognaise type sauce, but courgettes and aubergine are out of season and we work on a budget of £5 per head per day for food. The sauce I made today works out at £0.88 per head £18.49 in total. If you add the cost of the pasta in, it's £1.02 per head.

Bolognaise

Split the mince into 4 portions - for each portion, use the following quantities

Blitz 1 onion, 2 sticks of celery, 2 cloves of garlic, 2 peppers, 2 carrots and 100g of mushrooms
Cook down until softened
Add mince and cook through until browned
Add 2 tins of tomatoes, a large splodge of tomato puree and a teaspoon of marmite
Add a large sprinkle of oregano
Cook down until the sauce is thickened and the liquid reduced - for about half an hour or so

I did this 4 times, and working on the basis that one portion of that does 4-6 adult portions, I figure that we should easily accommodate 17 hungry guides and 4 hungry leaders. Please god let it, as there's now nothing else in my cupboards! 

And after all that... what did I end up having for my supper? You've guessed it

And if you've ever wanted to know what the shopping for 21 people for a 24 hour sleepover looks like...