Shocking figures in the kitchen on the Independence Of the Seas – Part 2

Whilst on board the Independence of the Sea I was privileged to go behind the scenes with the ships Executive Chef Alastair G., a British Chef from the Midlands. He gave us loads of information and the numbers they cater for is unbelievable. Have you ever even wondered where the food you see comes from? It ‘s all made on board! From every bread roll to every single piece of cake. Waste? Plenty! The Waste is 25% of all the food, all the food has a 4 hours time limit, after that it gets discarded. That’s because ships are regulated by different laws from the public health. The reason is that if there is an outbreak of food poisoning in the middle of the Ocean the ship would be in a big amount of trouble because there is no hospital to look after guests. As you can imagine the kitchen is huge and every section of the kitchen produces different types of food and every type of food is made by specialists in the sector. I saw a baker in action, part of the work is done by hand and partly by machinery. In the bakery section, they produce every single piece of bread and all the pastry you see on board. The amount of bread produced is incredible, for lunch, the daily amount of bread rolls produced is 10-12 thousand. At dinner from 6 to 8 thousand bread rolls, and the Cafe Promenade has 1 thousand, which means the bakers on board produce around 17 and 21 thousands of bread rolls a day plus all the other types of bread plus all the pastry.

The kitchen was spotless,  tidy and no food lying around, it is only cleaned with bleach and it is the cleanest place on the ship as you would imagine. Cleanliness rules are very strict, every waiter entering the kitchen will have to walk in a one-way system. As they enter they go straight to the sink to wash and sanitise their hands before taking fresh plates to take to the tables. There is even a sentinel standing by the sink to make sure no one skips the rules.

I was amazed to learn so much about the ship and the way they organize the flow for a smooth service, it was certainly an eye-opening experience and I was shocked to see how hard all those people work behind the scenes to make sure every single guest has more than enough food to consume. I feel privileged to have seen things from a different perspective, It has definitely made me appreciate the food on board more and not to take everything for granted as the enormous work goes on to keep us happy guests.

Look at those hands working,  A live video whilst chatting to the chef on the Independence of the Seas

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