W:
www.universitybusiness.co.uk/news/catering
"Some kitchens would require 10–12 chefs at any one time. Today it’s often nowhere close to that number" I
n a world where higher education continues to grow, it wouldn’t be a surprise to hear that university
kitchens are doing the same. Particularly given the domestic trend toward sprawling, open-plan kitchens, it would make perfect sense for HE food preparation facilities to be following a similar trajectory. Except for one problem: according to Keith Williams, head of trading at the University of Kent, they’re not. “The most noticeable change that I’ve
seen during my time in the sector is that industrial kitchens have got smaller,” he said. “We used to have some kitchens which would require 10 or 12 chefs in at any one time. Today it’s often nowhere close to that number.” Forget crowded kitchens sealed off from
daylight; modern university facilities, Williams said, tend to emphasise the comfort factor for staff. “Something you see with a lot of newer university kitchens is an emphasis on providing adequate daylight for people working in them.” The reason modern university kitchens
seem, as a rule, to be geting smaller rather than bigger has nothing to do with less students and faculty members to feed. Instead, much of it owes a debt to modern food preparation equipment, which allows a lot more to be done in a unit that
is physically smaller than its predecessors, and requires fewer users to operate it. “We recently added a Rational oven,
which is a combi-oven that allows you to do baking, steaming and various other types of food preparation in one oven,” Williams said. “On top of that, it’s also self-cleaning.
Not only does that cut down on the amount of equipment you need to have in a kitchen, but it also has the effect of limiting the number of chefs you require at any one time. It means that chefs can use daytime hours to do preparation of food to the plate, geting it ready, and can then re-generate that food for service – whether that refers to a blast chill, or heating. “When it comes to an evening banquet,
you no longer have to have between eight and 10 chefs working simultaneously, since you can do much the same job using between two and four chefs. It makes things far more efficient.”
Pushing the envelope As Williams is keen to point out, there’s also the mater of changing tastes when it comes to what consumers are looking for in terms of food. “I’m very proud to have chefs who are incredibly adventurous,” said Williams. “They are always willing to push the envelope by trying new
ABOVE: Tagine
ABOVE: Fillet of sea bass
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80