Fall Dinner
St. Helena's Catholic Church, Ellendale
Experience counts, and at St. Helena's of Ellendale, they have a little experience (maybe fifty years' worth, as people recollect) with serving the fall dinner in the church basement. So they have made some refinements in the usual arrangements for serving. In the first place, as people enter the side door and approach the stairs down, they notice two chaps stationed at the bottom of the stairs, ready to lend assistance. These are called "the catchers." Then, when it comes to serving the meal, the folks in charge have established a salad bar, which people file through before being directed to their seats. Then, servers come around and serve the turkey, cranberries, dressing, potatoes, and gravy family style. And after that the pie and coffee.
Although the current church building dates from only 1948, the parish goes back to settlement days, when it gathered in the German and German-Russian residents living mostly west of town and the Catholics from within town, including a sprinking of Irish. Today there is no longer any strong ethnic flavor to the parish. It is, however, a vital institution for the community. People from all the other churches in town, and from many miles around, attend the fall supper at St. Helena's. The spacious basement fills up, church members hustle here and there, and it becomes quite a spectacle. The pie table is especially impressive.
Some congregations organize their fall suppers by informal tradition, whereas others effect more formal organization. St. Helena's is in the latter camp. A detailed sheet of committee assignments (see link below) lays out who is expected to do what. The turkeys are purchased at the local grocery and farmed out to women of the parish to roast. The salads also are made in homes, according to several standard receipes. Everyone involved, except the turkey bakers, is supposed to bring pies. Mostly the enterprise is a women's project, under the auspices of the altar society, but men hold several posts (ticket table, carvers, and so on). Also, the assignment sheet enjoins all the men of the parish to turn out for set-up and take-down.
Poster 2007 / Committee Assignment Sheet 2007
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Photos by Tom Isern, 23 September 2007 |
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 | St. Helena's Fall Dinner, 23 September 2007 |
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| John & Bob at the Ticket Table, 23 September 2007 |  |
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Fall Suppers of the Northern Plains / Center for Heritage Renewal
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