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A Vintage feast
Ron Max, center of Napa, sautes some meat for the pasta sauce for the Vintage High School crab feed at Chardonnay Hall on Friday morning. Ed Fonville, left, also works on the sauce as Dan Ramos cleans up. This is the 30th year of the fundraiser which benefits athletic programs at VHS. J.L. Sousa/Register | Buy photos
Inside the creation of a crab feed fundraiser
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Comment8 a.m. Friday, Jan. 18: It's such a pleasure to watch men cook. Even at what feels like dawn, I find the sight of men wielding pots, pans and spoons is downright beautiful.
Note to self: Can I call these distinctly sports-type guys beautiful? Well, why not? After all, they were there long before I arrived in the kitchen with my mug of Peet's to prop myself against a wall and observe them working. This crew is volunteering the better part of two days to cook sauce for what my source for all things sports-related, the Register's esteemed executive sports editor Marty James, tells me is one of the two most important fundraisers that take place in Napa each year: The Vintage High School crab and pasta feed that support its sports program.
Note to self: Can I call these distinctly sports-type guys beautiful? Well, why not? After all, they were there long before I arrived in the kitchen with my mug of Peet's to prop myself against a wall and observe them working. This crew is volunteering the better part of two days to cook sauce for what my source for all things sports-related, the Register's esteemed executive sports editor Marty James, tells me is one of the two most important fundraisers that take place in Napa each year: The Vintage High School crab and pasta feed that support its sports program.
(Note to Napa High parents: He said the other one is Napa High's crab feed for sports.)
In fact, I might have recruited Marty to write his debut story for the Food Page, so enthusiastic is he about this event, except he was already signed up to be a volunteer server. Also, I was curious.
In fact, I might have recruited Marty to write his debut story for the Food Page, so enthusiastic is he about this event, except he was already signed up to be a volunteer server. Also, I was curious.
Thirty years ago Paul and Sonja Stornetta came up with the idea of a crab feed to support the Vintage High sports. Sonja Stornetta explained that they'd been cooking cioppino for a Napa Night Hawks' event, but, given that lack of funding for high school sports, they envisioned something much bigger, and an all-you-can-eat crab and pasta dinner seemed like an idea that would work.
It did. The first year, they served a crowd of 250. Since then the event has attracted as many as 1,000 guests. This grand, homecoming party is also the biggest source of support for sports programs both at Napa and Vintage, according to Bob Saunders, the event organizer and husband of the Vintage swim coach, Liza Saunders. And its success has inspired crab feeds throughout the area that are the highlights of January and February in the valley.
It did. The first year, they served a crowd of 250. Since then the event has attracted as many as 1,000 guests. This grand, homecoming party is also the biggest source of support for sports programs both at Napa and Vintage, according to Bob Saunders, the event organizer and husband of the Vintage swim coach, Liza Saunders. And its success has inspired crab feeds throughout the area that are the highlights of January and February in the valley.
Back to the pasta sauce. The Vintage crab feed is a home-grown affair, beginning with the sauce for the pasta. "We still use Paul Stornetta's recipe," explained Ron Max, who heads up the dinner crew, and oversees everything from ordering 2,500 pounds of crab to directing the many volunteers to serve the dinner, including crews of student athletes.
Max took over the dinner portion of the event four years ago, but has been working at it since the early '90s when his kids were students at Vintage. Although his kids have long since moved on, he, like many others, returns each year to help out. "The coaches gave a lot of time to my kids," he said. "It's my way of giving back."
Max had already done the shopping for the pasta dish, from a list that included 100 pounds of hamburger and 160 pounds of pasta. On Friday morning he's directing the amiable group of cooks assembled in the kitchen at Chardonnay Hall at Napa Expo, where the crab feed will take place Saturday night.
Also in the morning crew were two other veteran volunteers, Ed Fonville and John Unger. The newcomers to the team were Dan Ramos and Paul Wright, both parents of current athletes. They were the ones who got to chop up umpty-ump thousand pounds of onions, but being tough guys, they held up well. Unger used an industrial-sized opener -- Paul Stornetta recalled that the cooking crews at the first events wrecked two of his electric openers -- for can after huge can of tomato sauce and tomato puree (lost count here) to pour into two vats, each the size of a bathtub. Max and Fonville were frying the hamburger and sausage. Among the other ingredients on hand (for those who want to cook marinara sauce for 800) were one-pound containers of garlic, pepper and Italian seasonings, two jugs of Carlo Rossi burgundy (one went into the sauce early), two pounds of dried mushrooms, a case of canned mushroom stems and pieces (100 oz. cans) and one long salami.
"The salami," Max explained, "is for us."
4 p.m. Friday: The two tubs of sauce are simmering. The pots belong to Paul Stornetta who also fashioned the paddles the team uses to stir the sauce every six minutes. Two more have joined the crew, Mark Coleman, a former coach at Vintage, and Adam Croney who is wearing -- gasp -- a Napa High School sweatshirt. A football coach at Napa, he comments, "I really only want to beat Vintage one week a year." Another person stopping by is Jan Dalluge, a Napa purveyor who provides many of the supplies for the dinner from her business, Cash and Carry. "I just want to make sure everything's OK," says Dalluge, a Napa High alum. She's brought a bottle of her homemade wine, to go with the first tasting of the sauce, and Max brings out homemade liverwurst. The sauce is already pretty good. "Just wait till tomorrow," Max says.
They'll be staying with the sauce until 8 that night, when they'll turn it off and let it sit overnight. They'll be back at 8 a.m.
Noon, Saturday, Jan. 19: OK, I meant to be there at 8 a.m. but didn't quite make it. The cooking team did, however, they assure me. And so did the crab. Boxes and boxes of fresh Dugeness crab caught in the waters outside Eureka. In the parking lot, members of the baseball team are breaking up the crab into pieces, storing it in bags to put on ice till the evening. Inside the hall, decorations are going up in Vintage colors, burgundy and gold. The water polo and swim team members are serving out the portions of lemons and dressing for the salad. The football team's job is setting the tables for something like 700 expected guests.
It's time for another tasting of the sauce, which is back on its schedule of being stirred every six minutes. They're also cooking the rigatoni, which will be stored in plastic bags, and warmed up just before they serve it. "You can't cook that much pasta at the last minute," Fonville says.
As Max predicted, the sauce is even better. "Come back at 4," he tells me. "But this time, we're going to put you to work."
4 p.m. After a brief break, the cooking team has reassembled in the kitchen. Don Ramos, who lives in American Canyon, said he even had time to take a quick nap. The sauce has reached the level of: delectable. The pasta is cooked. Huge boxes of salad fixings have arrived. Bread is cut and in brown paper bags. The volunteer servers begin arriving; they have an option to eat dinner before they begin working. Among the serves, Max notes are "a lot of coaches -- it's their programs."
In the kitchen, country music is playing on someone's iPod. Beer or wine is offered to a reporter there for the long haul. Says Paul Wright, "It takes a lot of beer to make a good sauce."
6 p.m. Guests begin to arrive. Among them are the guests of honor, Paul and Sonja Stornetta. Paul shares his tips for making a good sauce:
* Use Hunt's tomato sauce and puree.
* Never add salt; you don't need it because you use Hunt's
* Wine is important, and so is Italian seasoning and garlic. "I like to add a little sausage too."
They used to cook the sauce out at the Stornetta's place, he adds, "until they were trying to pick up one pot of sauce and someone fell into it, elbow first."
In short order the huge Chardonnay Hall is filled with people. Spirits are clearly high. "Some people I only see once a year, here," observes Karen Fonville, Ed's wife, who takes on the job of filling 75-plus salad bowls.
"It's old home week,"says Liza Saunders. "This is a real community event."
"Everyone comes together for this," Bob Saunders added. Later that evening he'll be given a lifetime pass to the Vintage crab feed, for the service he's given to the event over the years.
Fifteen cases of wine, donated by local vintners, have been opened.
In the kitchen, they're ready. I decide to put on my press badge so as not to look like the idiot hanging out in the kitchen who doesn't know the answer to questions like where are the napkins and is there more butter.
7 p.m. The cooking crew springs into action. As the servers are carrying out the bowls of salad, the cooks form a precise assembly line: They dip baskets of pasta into boiling water and then drop the rigatoni into serving bowls. They dispense the sauce using a ladle the size of a basketball. Someone else stirs the mix and adds the Parmesan cheese. I'm not sure who's doing what because, true to his word, Max attempts the unthinkable and attempts to make a reporter be useful . My job: Put the serving tongs in and hand the bowls to the long line of servers. Bowl after bowl leaves the kitchen. They work like lightning, and only once does my press pass fall into a bowl, not, I hope, to the detriment of the sauce.
When the last server has carried off his bowl of pasta, the cooking crew files out back where the crab is waiting on ice, and there they start their next drill, emptying bags of crab into bowls that, too, are carried off by the tireless servers.
8:30 p.m. I'm not sure how it got to be 8:30. Time flies when you're actually doing something, instead of watching others. Every available space in the kitchen is piled high with empty bowls that have been returned by the servers. But for the crew, their work is over. The girls softball team will be coming in to bag the leftovers that will be sold, and on Sunday the wrestling team (which had a meet on Saturday) will wash the dishes.
Inside the great hall; the live auction is underway, and later there will be dancing to a live band. "Now, the fun begins," said Paul Wright.
As I head out the back door, I can't help but notice, I'm going to have to decipher my notes through pasta sauce covering my reporters' notebook. In fact, I'm somewhat doused with sauce, too, and my press badge is probably permanently splotched.
It is a beautiful thing to watch men cook, but kind of fun to end up wearing some of the dish.
]]>
Max took over the dinner portion of the event four years ago, but has been working at it since the early '90s when his kids were students at Vintage. Although his kids have long since moved on, he, like many others, returns each year to help out. "The coaches gave a lot of time to my kids," he said. "It's my way of giving back."
Max had already done the shopping for the pasta dish, from a list that included 100 pounds of hamburger and 160 pounds of pasta. On Friday morning he's directing the amiable group of cooks assembled in the kitchen at Chardonnay Hall at Napa Expo, where the crab feed will take place Saturday night.
Also in the morning crew were two other veteran volunteers, Ed Fonville and John Unger. The newcomers to the team were Dan Ramos and Paul Wright, both parents of current athletes. They were the ones who got to chop up umpty-ump thousand pounds of onions, but being tough guys, they held up well. Unger used an industrial-sized opener -- Paul Stornetta recalled that the cooking crews at the first events wrecked two of his electric openers -- for can after huge can of tomato sauce and tomato puree (lost count here) to pour into two vats, each the size of a bathtub. Max and Fonville were frying the hamburger and sausage. Among the other ingredients on hand (for those who want to cook marinara sauce for 800) were one-pound containers of garlic, pepper and Italian seasonings, two jugs of Carlo Rossi burgundy (one went into the sauce early), two pounds of dried mushrooms, a case of canned mushroom stems and pieces (100 oz. cans) and one long salami.
"The salami," Max explained, "is for us."
4 p.m. Friday: The two tubs of sauce are simmering. The pots belong to Paul Stornetta who also fashioned the paddles the team uses to stir the sauce every six minutes. Two more have joined the crew, Mark Coleman, a former coach at Vintage, and Adam Croney who is wearing -- gasp -- a Napa High School sweatshirt. A football coach at Napa, he comments, "I really only want to beat Vintage one week a year." Another person stopping by is Jan Dalluge, a Napa purveyor who provides many of the supplies for the dinner from her business, Cash and Carry. "I just want to make sure everything's OK," says Dalluge, a Napa High alum. She's brought a bottle of her homemade wine, to go with the first tasting of the sauce, and Max brings out homemade liverwurst. The sauce is already pretty good. "Just wait till tomorrow," Max says.
They'll be staying with the sauce until 8 that night, when they'll turn it off and let it sit overnight. They'll be back at 8 a.m.
Noon, Saturday, Jan. 19: OK, I meant to be there at 8 a.m. but didn't quite make it. The cooking team did, however, they assure me. And so did the crab. Boxes and boxes of fresh Dugeness crab caught in the waters outside Eureka. In the parking lot, members of the baseball team are breaking up the crab into pieces, storing it in bags to put on ice till the evening. Inside the hall, decorations are going up in Vintage colors, burgundy and gold. The water polo and swim team members are serving out the portions of lemons and dressing for the salad. The football team's job is setting the tables for something like 700 expected guests.
It's time for another tasting of the sauce, which is back on its schedule of being stirred every six minutes. They're also cooking the rigatoni, which will be stored in plastic bags, and warmed up just before they serve it. "You can't cook that much pasta at the last minute," Fonville says.
As Max predicted, the sauce is even better. "Come back at 4," he tells me. "But this time, we're going to put you to work."
4 p.m. After a brief break, the cooking team has reassembled in the kitchen. Don Ramos, who lives in American Canyon, said he even had time to take a quick nap. The sauce has reached the level of: delectable. The pasta is cooked. Huge boxes of salad fixings have arrived. Bread is cut and in brown paper bags. The volunteer servers begin arriving; they have an option to eat dinner before they begin working. Among the serves, Max notes are "a lot of coaches -- it's their programs."
In the kitchen, country music is playing on someone's iPod. Beer or wine is offered to a reporter there for the long haul. Says Paul Wright, "It takes a lot of beer to make a good sauce."
6 p.m. Guests begin to arrive. Among them are the guests of honor, Paul and Sonja Stornetta. Paul shares his tips for making a good sauce:
* Use Hunt's tomato sauce and puree.
* Never add salt; you don't need it because you use Hunt's
* Wine is important, and so is Italian seasoning and garlic. "I like to add a little sausage too."
They used to cook the sauce out at the Stornetta's place, he adds, "until they were trying to pick up one pot of sauce and someone fell into it, elbow first."
In short order the huge Chardonnay Hall is filled with people. Spirits are clearly high. "Some people I only see once a year, here," observes Karen Fonville, Ed's wife, who takes on the job of filling 75-plus salad bowls.
"It's old home week,"says Liza Saunders. "This is a real community event."
"Everyone comes together for this," Bob Saunders added. Later that evening he'll be given a lifetime pass to the Vintage crab feed, for the service he's given to the event over the years.
Fifteen cases of wine, donated by local vintners, have been opened.
In the kitchen, they're ready. I decide to put on my press badge so as not to look like the idiot hanging out in the kitchen who doesn't know the answer to questions like where are the napkins and is there more butter.
7 p.m. The cooking crew springs into action. As the servers are carrying out the bowls of salad, the cooks form a precise assembly line: They dip baskets of pasta into boiling water and then drop the rigatoni into serving bowls. They dispense the sauce using a ladle the size of a basketball. Someone else stirs the mix and adds the Parmesan cheese. I'm not sure who's doing what because, true to his word, Max attempts the unthinkable and attempts to make a reporter be useful . My job: Put the serving tongs in and hand the bowls to the long line of servers. Bowl after bowl leaves the kitchen. They work like lightning, and only once does my press pass fall into a bowl, not, I hope, to the detriment of the sauce.
When the last server has carried off his bowl of pasta, the cooking crew files out back where the crab is waiting on ice, and there they start their next drill, emptying bags of crab into bowls that, too, are carried off by the tireless servers.
8:30 p.m. I'm not sure how it got to be 8:30. Time flies when you're actually doing something, instead of watching others. Every available space in the kitchen is piled high with empty bowls that have been returned by the servers. But for the crew, their work is over. The girls softball team will be coming in to bag the leftovers that will be sold, and on Sunday the wrestling team (which had a meet on Saturday) will wash the dishes.
Inside the great hall; the live auction is underway, and later there will be dancing to a live band. "Now, the fun begins," said Paul Wright.
As I head out the back door, I can't help but notice, I'm going to have to decipher my notes through pasta sauce covering my reporters' notebook. In fact, I'm somewhat doused with sauce, too, and my press badge is probably permanently splotched.
It is a beautiful thing to watch men cook, but kind of fun to end up wearing some of the dish.
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