In my column today and earlier in the week here on The Beehive, I talked about my participation in today's Men Who Cook event at the Fresno Art Museum.

It's a fundraiser for the museum where about 70 guys prepare food. Attendees pay $20 and can sample as much as they want.

I'm making chicken tacos -- what I thought wouldn't be tough, but soon realized is crazy work. The reality of cooking for 200 people set in and I freaked.

As I prepare for Men Who Cook I'm going to be keeping a journal here on The Beehive. So you can check back to see how I do -- or even better, come out and try my tacos.

8:30 p.m. Thursday
Night before preparation is done. I've picked up all my equipment and food. Thanks to Bobby Salazar for chicken, salsa and a huge tortilla-cooking stove. And thanks to Celena for a mega-crockpot. I'll be using five of them. I picked up the tortillas from La Tapatia on Wednesday.

This evening I went to the store and bought all my produce (onions, cilanto, cabbage and limes) as well as salsa to cook with and some spices. I came home and rubbed the chicken with spices -- California chili powder, general Pappy's seasoning and a little paprika and chayanne pepper. I bagged the chicken (about five pounds per bag) and put them in the fridge.

My fridge is packed with taco-making accessories:

8:08 a.m. today
My army of crockpots is ready to go:

8:23 a.m.
My fiancee came down the stairs on her way to work and said, "It smells like tacos." I told her not quite yet. But I'm on my way. The chicken is cooking -- all 25+ pounds of it.

I filled the crockpots with a layer of salsa at the bottom, added some chicken, another layer of salsa, more chicken and topped it off with salsa again. My goal is flavor. Between the spices and the salsa, my chicken should have it. I'm love spicy foods, so that's what my tacos will be.

All the crockpots are cooking on low and the chicken has about eight hours of slow-cooking goodness ahead of it.

9:35 a.m.
There's already a great salsa-y aroma floating through the house. Yum.

I just went down to give check the chicken -- tell me it doesn't look delicious. Or at least soon to be delicious.

1:15 p.m.
Just checked the chicken. It's starting to fall apart a little bit -- as it should. We're getting close. It's smelling good, too.

While it's been cooking -- since I'm so OCD about this today -- I made myself a little timeline for the afternoon and a few lists:

Timeline:
Sign for my table: 3:15 p.m.
Cut produce, put on ice: 3:30 p.m.
Take chicken out of crockpots: 4 p.m.
Leave: 4:20 p.m.
Arrive/set-up: 4:30 p.m.

Things I Need to Get:
- Ziploc containers for produce
- Plastic spoons
- Ice for produce

Things to Remember to Bring:
- Thermos with hot water

2:45 p.m.
I took inventory of my equipment. There's the big cooler to carry the meat in. The chafing dish for keeping it warm while I serve. Some Ziplock containers for the produce and salsa. I'm gonna keep those on ice in another cooler.

I also have a butane-fueled stove that Bobby Salazar hooked me up with that I'll use to cook the tortillas on site.

3:05 p.m.
Just had my first taste of the chicken. It's looking (and tasting) RIGHT. It's about to that point where I can't even pick up a piece of chicken without it falling apart.

That's good chicken!

The Rest of the Day (as told Saturday morning):
Around 3:10 p.m. things got hectic, so I wasn't able to come back and add more to this. I decided to start cutting the produce a little earlier than I was planning on, and good thing I did. It was more of a chore than I thought.

Some people can't stand cilantro, I love it. Cutting it was my favorite part. My least favorite, the part I couldn't stand. ONIONS! Just look at me. I almost had to call in to Men Who Cook and say "Sorry, I can't do it, the onions have killed my senses. I'm on the DL."

Once I splashed water all over my face to get rid of the onion-y irritant, I got going on the chicken. It came out just as I hoped. I plopped it out of the crockpots into our big tin pans. Using my tongs and a big plastic fork I shredded it, which was really easy considering how tender it was after eight hours in the crockpot.

I packed up all my stuff -- by this time I was running more than a half hour late, mind you -- and hit the road. My car was way full, between two coolers, the stove for the tortillas, the butane and one box of random stuff. When I arrived at the museum I lugged everything in and set up.

Thanks to help from a few other Men Who (Actually Knew How To) Cook -- I got my chafing dish and my stove working properly and Mike Oz the Taco Pusher was in business.

The crowd was hungry -- things got going right at 6. I put my first batch of tacos at 5:55 p.m., I think, and they were gone within a few minutes. By 6:30, the crowd was eating the tacos quicker than I could put them together.

I was cooking up 8-10 tortillas at a time on the stove, filling them and putting them out for people to take. I made a small salsa/produce bar, so people could serve themselves. That was a win-win.

Overall, I think my tacos were a hit. Numerous people came up to me and said they read my column and had to try my tacos. A lot of people came back and told me they were really good (thanks!). A few people even came up and said they heard people talking (positively, I'm assuming) about the tacos (double thanks!)

By the end of the night, I think I made closer to 300 than 200 tacos. I brought 420 tortillas, doubling up on them in the beginning -- but soon realizing that I was close to running out. So I started using single tortillas about an hour in.

Needless to say, I was really exhausted afterward. Once the food rush died down at about 8:30 p.m. and I made a quick round of the other guys tables (the brisket was great, so was the sausage) and found myself at ...

Much thanks to everyone who helped out, everyone who tried my tacos and everyone who just came out to Men Who Cook. The Fresno Art Museum and the numerous chefs did a fantastic job. It was a really cool event. And I was proud to be involved.

BONUS PHOTOS

A shout out to my sponsors, Bobby Salazar and La Tapitia.

Me and H-Mac -- Beehive represent!

*Special thanks for my fiancee, Tanya, for taking the at-the-event photos.