Cooks, Institution and Cafeteria

A Day in the Life

Whether you prepare lunch for students, correctional facility inmates or hospital patients, your mornings start early. Depending on your role in the kitchen, where you're located and the menu you've planned, you may be up at dawn. Although some cafeterias take delivery of pre-made rolls that only need a final browning in the oven, yours might not have that option. Rural schools, prison facilities and offshore oil rigs serve hundreds, but they don't have the storage space for pre-baked breads. If you're in charge of baking duties, you'll be the first one at work.

When you get to the kitchen, everything is spotless. Gleaming stainless steel counters and organized walk-in refrigerators aren't just for show in an institutional kitchen, especially those that serve young children or hospital patients who may be more vulnerable to food-borne illness. With so many people eating the same food from the same kitchen, food safety is paramount. You wash your hands often throughout the day and change gloves frequently. In a large kitchen, you might be assigned to stations to ensure better food safety.

If your school or hospital serves breakfast, you'll start preparing it as soon as you have the dough for the rolls ready to rise. With many hungry people to serve, you don't have time to crack hundreds of eggs, so you head to the walk-in and hoist a bag of shelled raw eggs for scrambling. It won't be the last heavy lifting you'll do during the day; as an institutional cafeteria cook, you regularly carry large cans and boxes. The heavily laden steam-table pans and sheet trays that hold the food can weigh a lot, too, so your knees, arms and back get a work-out just moving food to the service line.

The breakfast menu is designed for speed. Many elements are made the day before to keep the food coming to the line quickly. To go with the scrambled eggs, you serve pancakes from the batter you prepared yesterday, rounding out the meal with fruit cups you'd filled two days ago. The fruit seems to be a big hit, and you make a note to fill more cups today after lunch service. If you work in a hospital, your breakfast service might take longer. You must prepare separate meals for patients on low-sodium, low-fat or low-sugar diets.

After breakfast is cooked and served, you start lunch preparation. Today is baked spaghetti with meat sauce, so you have a fairly easy day ahead of you. You boil the pasta al dente so that it doesn't overcook when you bake it and add a little extra oregano and basil to the pre-made sauce. Baked summer squash is on the menu too, so you chop the squash and portion the slices in pans, drizzling them with olive oil and sprinkling with salt and pepper. If you work in a hospital, you leave one pan unsalted and add herbs to accommodate patients who can't have excess sodium.

Your day doesn't end after lunch service. Prep for future menus often begins a day or two before, so you'll start chopping, pureeing and stewing as soon as lunches have been served. For cafeterias that serve three meals a day, the latter half of your work day may include preparing foods for the next shift. On a day with an easy lunch service, you're out by early afternoon. Busy days may keep you a little later, but you're rarely in the kitchen past 3:00 if you work a breakfast and lunch service.