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What's
Wrong with This Picture?
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This
critique is based on the fact that this is a hospital tray in a
setting where most of the customers are seniors who frequently
complain that they get too much food.
The
recommendations are based on my experience, and "trial and
error" while working in hundreds of different hospitals over a
30 year period.
If
you find yourself thinking that you just can't make these
changes in your facility then you really need to attend the
ASHFSA pre-conference.
Hundreds
of hospitals are already making the changes, and they have the same
challenges that you do. At the conference, we can show you how
to make it happen with your resistant team, that have been on the
job for years.
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- Overall
the tray is messy and disorganized due to a lack of specific
standards for the location of all the products on it. It looks
like everything was just thrown on the tray.
- It
is better to have the silverware, napkin and diet kit on the
right since most folks are right handed.
- A
roll on a small bread and butter plate with a doily is more
elegant than the prewrapped bread concept.
- In
a salad, iceberg lettuce alone is anemic looking. The mix
should have 25 or 30% dark green lettuce such as Romaine or green
leaf. It also needs a very small amount of shredded carrots and
purple cabbage. And, there is too much lettuce in the bowl.
Most hospital patients prefer small servings.
- Angel
food cake or pound cake by itself on a paper plate is just about as
low as you can go on the "class", and "quality"
scale. Since people eat with their eyes first, these bland,
boring desserts either have to be enhanced or eliminated. In
general, use paper only when your dish machine is broken down, your
food service team didn't show up for work, your facility is near
bankruptcy, or you're in the middle of some sort of major crisis.
Paper may work on insulated trays because it's nearly impossible to
make insulated trays look great. The paper doesn't stand out as
much with insulated trays.
- All
condiments need to be in a 3 to 4 oz. clear, disposable plastic, low
profile cup, or in the re-usable plastic fluted cup. The
practice of simply tossing the condiments on the tray is
"tacky" and sends the wrong message. You can afford
the plastic cup because you'll save $20,000 to $50,000 per year (due
to forced portion control) if you use a very small
"monkey"/fruit dishes for all of your side dishes such as
canned fruit.
- Look
at the hot plate. They have served 100% too many wax beans.
This is not uncommon. What's more, wax beans (because they are
anemic looking) should be avoided on patient menus. Using wax
beans is like shooting yourself in the foot.
- Notice
that there's no gravy. This is not as uncommon as you think.
We believe a gravy, glaze or sauce is necessary on almost all meats to
make them more palatable. Not instant gravy either, but gravy
made from natural defatted drippings, quality meat base, and a
thickener of your choice. The mashed potatoes should be indented
and have gravy on them. The meat should be located at 6 o'clock
not 3 o'clock.
- This
hot plate needs a garnish. Also, an ideally written menu would
offer scalloped apples (Stouffers for example) with the pork as an
extra touch of excellence. It's like cranberry sauce and turkey-
they go together naturally. Perhaps the hot plate wouldn't need
a garnish if a beautiful, upscale vegetable blend was offered.
We recommend lots of the new attractive vegetable blends on patient
menus.
- We
have more constructive comments but space is limited, so now look at
the next photo (#2) of a more attractive patient tray that we would
score at the 10 level.
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