Archive: Around Town

Dave HatfieldIf there is one thing you don't want to be in Lansing, it is a chicken!  Lansing is famous for its chicken barbecues, at least one every week while the weather is good.  Every summer weekend a chicken barbecue may be found in front of the Lansing Town Hall to benefit one of the many causes townspeople support.  More often than not the chef behind the chicken is Dave Hatfield.  Hatfield estimates that this summer alone he will have barbecued 5,000 chicken halves.

He does it to support the community he has lived in all his life.  "It's the reaction from the kids," he says.  "They usually send me a thank you.  It means children are being raised right.  If they didn't care or just took it for granted, I'd stop.  This town takes care of their young.  You know 'It takes a village to raise a child?'  It's a pretty good village we have here."

A power plant mechanic at AES Cayuga, Hatfield started chicken barbecues in 2000 to support his kids varsity teams when they were at Lansing high School.  His daughter was on the girls swim team, two sons played football, and a third son played basketball.  Soon others began asking him to provide barbecues for their teams and causes.  Eventually that led to private parties, and Hatfield Catering and Tent Rental because a second job for Hatfield.


Except it isn't a job so much as a labor of love.  Today he provides the service at cost to countless charitable groups and school teams.  He has barbecued for benefits for the varsity baseball, basketball, girls swimming, girls volleyball, girls and boys soccer, boys football, wrestling, and softball teams.  Other benefits include Relay For Life, SADD, the theater booster club LTAPPA,  the Red Jacket Pony Club Tompkins County Kennel Club, and the The North Log Cabin building fund.

"When I started out that's all I did," he says.  "The kids parents would call me up for team sports, or could I cook for their graduation party.  I evolved into the tent rental business.  It keeps me busy."

Today he does barbecues for hire as well.   These have included a farewell party for a girl about to go to France to play soccer, several graduation parties, weddings, and graduation parties.  He'll be cooking 500 halves at Lansing Harbor Festival.  Last week while cooking 300 chicken halves for the log cabin fundraiser, he also barbecued chicken for a birthday party, a graduation party, and a family reunion.  He notes that his wife puts up with a lot because he is out cooking chicken so much of the time.

While he only cooks chicken for charitable sales because it is easy to package and take away, he offers a variety of foods for his paid gigs.  A few weeks ago he provided tents and catering for a wedding of about 200 people.  He provided pulled pork, sliced roast beef, and chicken.

Hatfield slow-cooks the chicken on huge barbecue pits.  The pits weigh a few hundred pounds, but Hatfield has worked out a way to get them onto and off of his truck by himself.  He begins setting up the pits on a Thursday or Friday night, then gets up at five in the morning on Saturday to bring coolers, potato pots and other equipment.  Next he goes to get the chicken and is back to start the charcoal by 7am.

When the chicken is cooked it goes into coolers for the chartable group to sell.  Then cleanup begins, running through the afternoon.  He finishes when he picks up the barbecue pits on Sunday.


For most charitable events he cooks 300 halves, typically for three hours, turning racks at a time and painting them with Cornell Sauce, developed by Lansing's Bob Baker.  Baker, now deceased, developed the sauce and more than 50 ways of serving chicken during his career at Cornell University and was recognized as the leading expert on cooking and serving chicken in the world.

Hatfield doesn't like to take credit for doing what he does.  He has nothing but good things to say about others who barbecue chicken in town and especially the people who help him with his barbecues.

"A lot of good folks do a lot of good things for this town," he says.  "Don't give me too much glory.  If it weren't for Rick Sills, Tom MacKenzie, Dave Buck -- you can't do it alone.  Nobody can.  A lot of good people help with this."

Hatfield says he enjoyed cooking for the log cabin because it was very near to where he grew up.  The 1791 cabin was moved from its original location near the corner of Searles and Conlon Roads in 1844 to a property north on Conlon Road that happened to be across the road from the Hatfield home.

"It's kind of neat that it was in our neighborhood," he says.  Or we were in their neighborhood -- they were there first."

Although he doesn't like to take credit, Hatfield likes to give back to the community in any way he can.  He also serves on the Lansing Town Planning Board, but says that giving back is simply part of what Lansing is all about.

"That's what I think makes this town unique," he says.  "It's a town of a lot of people watching out for a lot of people and helping out.  It's a labor of love.  You do it because the kids in this town are worth taking care of.  Some day they'll take care of us back."

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