$40,000 Ovens Are Rad

A couple weeks ago I cooked for 125 people at the Portuguese Hall in Shelter island. While i think all ovens are rad. This behemoth oven was over the top.

 

oven

 This was the first time in years that I had been around any serious cooking equipment.  As I was turning on 3 different ovens to bake my cakes, the guy that oversees the place said (with a twinkle in his eye); “come over here; you wanna use this oven?”  Not being one to impose and being a little intimidated, I initially said no, but the guy insisted it was easy and he’d show me how.  This oven was friggin’ huge.  In the picture you see below, those are my cakes.  Each pan is a hotel pan…a chaffing dish pan for those not down with the lingo.  Roughly 20″x 12″.   cakes

Please note the rack with which the cakes sit; yeah, there are 6 of those, all rotating within the oven.  I could have cooked 24 of those cakes all in 45 minutes!  And since it is always rotating it cooks everything totally even.  Sorry I’m nerding out on you here but the magnitude of it makes me proud of human engineering.

Here was the menu:

Appetizers:
Olives, flatbread and cut veggies with fresh hummus and babaganoush

Dinner:
Marinated and grilled garlic chicken thighs 
Beef kofte (Mediterranean grilled meatballs) 
Grilled peppers and onions
Greek salad- feta, romaine, fresh dill-parsley-cilantro, green onion, sumac, red wine vinaigrette
Yellow rice
Tzatziki
Warm pita

Dessert:
Honey and olive oil pound cake with vanilla whipped cream, toasted almonds and seasonal fruit