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Silver service… national success for Nottingham team that makes over 2m meals a year
It's a question on everybody's lips when we ask about a hospital stay: how was the food? It's the one essential service that most of us will have an opinion on.
Now Catering Services at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH) – which creates around 2,190,000 meals a year for patients and staff – is being recognised as among the very best in the country.
Two NUH chefs have just won a silver award in a national ‘chef showcase’. And with their colleagues - chefs, technicians, dieticians, servers, and support staff who make up Catering Services - they have been shortlisted for the Hospital Caterers’ Association (HCA) Catering Team of the Year Award.
The silver award was won by Pete Carlisle, Food Production Assistant Manager, and Andrew Fewster, Food Production Team Leader, in the HCA’s Chef Showcase in the Hotel, Restaurant and Catering Show (HRC) in London.
The pair had an hour to produce a three-course patient meal for under £8 a head, in front of a live audience and against six other Trusts. Menus were assessed for nutritional value, seasonality, and sustainability, and chefs were assessed for skills, teamwork, and cleanliness.
NUH’s menu featured butternut squash soup and venison steak in a white wine and mushroom sauce, served with golden Duchess potatoes, glazed baton carrots, and tender-stem broccoli. Poached pears with a plant-based chocolate sauce and Chantilly cream rounded off the meal.
Pete and Andrew were supported by Matt Thornton, winner of the Care/Hospital Caterer of the Year Award at the Excellence in Vegetarian and Vegan Care Catering Awards Food Production Awards last year, and Nicola Strawther, NUH Chief Dietetic Technician in the Trust’s central production unit (CPU).
Andrew said: “Thanks to the support of colleagues around me at the CPU and the event, I had a great experience, enjoyed the day, and was very pleased to get a silver award.”
Nicola said: “The team worked exceptionally well. They delivered three excellent courses; their professionalism was admirable, and they represented NUH so well. Winning a silver award is a huge testament to the weeks of practice they put into developing the menu - fingers crossed for the HCA Awards evening next week.”
At NUH, a 65-strong team creates up to 6,000 meals a day for around 1,900 patients at the CPU at City Hospital, sourcing 65% of ingredients from local farmers and suppliers. A further 350 assistants work with staff and volunteers on the wards to support patients at mealtimes. And their success owes much to strong teamwork.
NUH has more than 60 menus, including halal, allergen-free, and vegan, as well as other dietary requirements – and its new menus will now carry the Coeliac UK Accreditation symbol after it became one of a handful of Trusts to be awarded the highest accreditation, after a 12-month process led by Food Production Manager Sue Austin.
Sophie Yelland, of Coeliac UK, said: “Sue was committed to ensuring NUH’s provision of gluten-free food met the needs of patients with coeliac disease. Sue took a collaborative and pragmatic approach internally with colleagues and externally with Coeliac UK, and overcame operational challenges to guide NUH to meet the requirements of Coeliac UK’s Gluten-Free Audit Standard.”
The team are no strangers to success; they won the Hospital Catering Award at the Public Sector Catering Awards for their work on our infant feeding menu.