Arden Dinner Gild

A few quick notes on the Gild system in Arden. A gild is a club. Like guild, except that in the early 1900's  when Arden was in its infancy, the Georgists who ran the show were part of a movement to spell words the way they were pronounced. They dropped the "u" in gild and have been explaining the letter deficiency ever since. According to the Arden Club web site: The Arden Club, Inc. is the cultural umbrella group for many Gilds in the three Ardens: The Village of Arden, Ardentown, and Ardencroft. Most activities take place in Gild Hall, which dates back to the 1850 when it was used as a barn for the Grubb farm. It was substantially renovated in 1910 as the Gild Hall and can be rented for special affairs. The grassy amphitheater of the Moonlight Theater sits to one side of Gild Hall, and the Swim Gild’s swimming pool sits behind Gild Hall.  At this point in Arden Club history we have the following gilds: Ardensingers, Concert, Dinner, Folk Dancing, Gardeners, Georgist (this gild is in limbo at this writing), Library, Poetry, Scholars, Shakespeare, Swim, and the newest gild--The Bridge Gild. Gilds have a couple of responsibilities throughout the year. They must participate in the Arden Fair to perform a needed service or to do something, like manning the baked goods table or overseeing the book sale, that raises money for the Club. Each gild must also provide a dinner for the Dinner Gild.

Last month, I attended a talk at the Scholar's Gild given by Henry Voight, a man who collects historical menus. As a foodie and an American history buff, I was intrigued on several levels by his presetation. Mr. Voight gave the history of our country told through food, and yet the talk was not quite about food. Did you know that restaurants as we know them only started in the 1840's in this country? He showed menus from restaurants, club dinners, Civil War reunion dinners, and in one case, he showed a menu from some sort of town gathering. June, one of the oldest residents in town and an active member of the Arden Craft Shop Historical Museum, asked Mr. Voight if he would be interested in seeing the menus that they had for The Dinner Gild. Mr. Voight brushed her off--not understanding the gold she was offering. He neglected to see the historical value, which is a shame. We in the Ardens know. We were treated to a museum exhibit that centered on The Dinner Gild, its history, menus, and recipes.

The Dinner Gild has been in existence for decades. My memory is telling me somewhere in the 1940's or 50's, but June could tell you for sure. At age 91, her memory is sharp as a tack. Mark and I met June when we drove down to Dinner Gild in those hazy months before we actually moved to Arden. We tried to reintroduce ourselves to her when we actually did move to Arden, but she didn't need a refresher; she knew who we were.

Imagine this. The Dinner Gild oversees weekly dinners for 100-140 people from October through the middle of May with a week off for Thanksgiving and another week or two off at Christmas. At the very least, they probably implement 30 dinners in a season. I continually remind my friends from outside The Ardens that we have perhaps a pool of 600 adults in the three communities. The amount of volunteerism needed to run our organizations  and events is staggering. It probably takes at the very least, ten volunteers to pull off any one dinner. Often it is more. These dinners are nothing short of incredible. The kick-off dinner is typically beef tenderloin and crab cake (though this year, they went without the crab cake). With all the creativity in the Ardens, the menus are a thing of art. Literally. David, a local artist, gardener, handyman extraordinaire creates chalkboard art to accompany each and every menu.

Chalkboard Art by David Yoder

So let's talk menus. This weekend's feature was Chicken Mole which has become an annual tradition. I'm not going to run down all the food we have eaten at Dinner Gild but here are some of offerings which stand out in my mind: Peanut Chicken with Sesame Noodles, Rochester Garbage Plate, Day of the Dead taco dinner, Eggplant Parmesan, Chicken Marsala, Pork Tenderloin, Cincinnati Chili, Beer-sauced short ribs, German sausage and kraut, Mardi Gras gumbo, and a 420 dinner which featured foods you might find in the parking lot of a Grateful Dead concert. We were pressed into dinner gild service one evening while sitting around a fire making S'mores in October just after we had moved in in late June. We agreed to lead a Pennsylvania Dutch dinner of Chicken Bott Boi, brown butter carrots, salad with sweet and sour dressing, and rolls with apple butter. It was a success, and we repeated the dinner again this year.

You will find salads with such ingredients as pears and hazelnuts, and homemade breads with compound butters. The desserts can be anything from Mississippi Mud Pie to coconut rice pudding. Chocolate caramel bread pudding to homemade pumpkin ice-cream with a ginger snap. The desserts for our Pennsylvania Dutch dinner in January included red velvet whoopie pies and shoo-fly cupcakes. Where else can you get a dinner of this caliber for $11 a head? ($13 for non-Arden club members.)

This Saturday, Mark and I walked from our house carrying our bottle of wine. Those en route to the dinner in cars, rolled down their windows and promised not to run us over. The wine bottle was a dead giveaway as to where we were headed. We got to the lower Gild Hall right at six and found ourselves at the end of a long line. The Gild Hall had a little snafu with its floors. Seems the folks who built the barn put the floor right on top of dirt with nothing to support it in one section. This was preliminary action of a $300,000 kitchen renovation coming this summer. Part of the lower hall was cordoned off with dividers and plastic because of the work being done. No worries, the Chicken Mole crew decorated over the plastic, but the new arrangement cost the dinner three tables of ten. With such a popular dinner and the loss of seating, you could see latecomers mentally calculate the remaining available seating. Musical chairs--for real. The tables were festooned in brilliant colors with confetti in the shape of little cacti and set with baskets of chips and homemade mango salsa next to baskets of warm tortillas and honey butter.  Mark and I did a "no-no" and put our coats and wine bottle at a table in the back room to reserve two seats next to a former town chair and his wife who works in R&D at Dupont. Yes, we were cheating at musical chairs.

Chef's table at dinner gild

This leads me to the very essence of Dinner Gild, and it is none of the things I have mentioned so far. Though there are those who sit with the same people each week, we do not. We squeeze in where we can. In this way, we have managed to meet so many of our neighbors. I really think this has made all the difference in the way we were able to assimilate into Arden village life. The conversations we have are fresh and fascinating. One week we are talking beekeeping with Ron, and the next week we are talking about a trip to China with...well.. a different Ron. Sometimes we eat with our most immediate neighbors, and we keep abreast of what is going on with them. How often do you live beside someone and know nothing about them? Too many times to count, in our lives. We have sat beside June and let her recount the history of all the people who have lived in our house during her lifetime. June is a treasure, and any time the seat next to her is open, you should take it. We have also sat next to June's son Allan and his wife Sharon. One such interaction led to an impromptu game night at their house. Game night is always a possibility except when, on a night like last night, there was a concert offering going on upstairs.

Also, on dinner nights, the library is open upstairs. You can check out the latest book by Anne Patchett (which I have done) or listen in on children's story time around the fireplace. I do want to volunteer to do story time at some point. I really miss reading to my kids. Last night, Mark and I were too tired to attend the concert or go to the library. With the threat of daylight savings time change looming over us, we walked home to watch a movie. On the whole walk home, we were groaning that we ate too much. Smart people bring containers to Dinner Gild, because most times, you can very easily package half your dinner and have something to eat the next day.

Mr. Voight did not know what he was turning away when he dismissed the invitation to peer into the history of Arden's food service. Oh, the stories he could have uncovered.