For just over 2 months now, the Culinary Staff of Central
Baptist Village has been busy… traveling.
In midsummer, we
decided to tackle a few challenges:
1.
What can we do to bridge the gap of time between
late summer and the mid fall, when there are so few holidays to celebrate?
2.
How can we encourage our residents to try a
wider range of ethnic and cultural dishes, in a way that would be fun?
3.
How can we strengthen the relationships of all
our cooks and our residents?
After some thought, we partnered with the Activities team,
and launched “Around the World in 80 Plates – a 10 week Culinary adventure”.
We set up a huge world map, decorated the dining room with
globes, and handed out globe key chains and passports to each resident. Every
Monday and Friday we set up an additional meal choice that was local to the
city we “arrived” in. These meals were
all display stations and each member of our culinary staff took turns cooking
the meals during service. In addition,
each time a resident chose the special, they received a stamp in their
passports. The world map has been updated, and the meals have been well
received.
More interesting; this promotion has truly created “taste
memories”; as our residents will gather
around the world map, show off their passports and chat about their personal travels. We are very
proud of the experience this has created, for our residents, the staff and our
cooks.