Week 1: May 9th-13th, 2011

Tuesday May 10th, 2011

Today I got to work with Nate for the first time.  When I arrived at the kitchen at around 8:50, he pointed at the bag of potatoes sitting on the table and said, "I want you to peel all those for me."  I just stood there gaping at him.  I thought he was actually being serious.  I later learned that Erin (lady who used to work at Jakes) told him about my "issue" with potatoes from yesterday and she told Nate to ask me to peel that bag of potatoes as a joke.  Ah well, I took the whole thing in stride.

Throughout the morning, I was tasked with doing different jobs like cutting/cleaving vegetables for the vegetable quiche, cutting and steaming the potatoes for the potato salad and scooping the pasta out from a huge machine thing that was soaking the pasta in cold water.  All three things were served at lunch today in some way.  When I was cutting some of the vegetables in the morning, I also sliced my thumb open.  For those of you who ate the quiche, I hope you don't get sick from blood poisoning!..... jokes...  We threw away the blood-infested vegies.  But this whole incident is a part of kitchen life.  Accidents like this happens all the time.  Now I have to be more aware when cutting things or when handling objects that could potentially lead to some injury.  Lunch seemed to be extremely popular today!  The potato salad was gone half an hour after the start of service and the sandwiches soon followed.  A lot of students and teachers came up to me and repeatedly kept telling me the food was really good.  As a person working in the kitchen, it is a true compliment when your "customers" say that especially if multiple people say it.

After lunch Nate left so I helped Deb and Nancy clean the main dinning hall area: the cereal bar, the hot food line, the salad bar among others.  I also helped them wash and put away glasses, utensils and other cooking equipment.  Deb told me that Nancy wouldn't be here tomorrow, so I have to do everything that Nancy's doing/did today.  Since Barbara didn't need any help, she said I could leave early.  Thanks Barbara!  Before I left, Steve asked me if I wanted to help him peel another bag of potatoes.  I politely refused and left the building.  Today was another interesting day in the kitchen.  Tomorrow being a Wednesday, should be even busier than the last two days.  Hope I can measure up to the tasks at hand!