How The World's Largest Cruise Ship Makes 30,000 Meals Every Day

every week over six thousand six hundred people vacation aboard the world's largest cruise ship and all those people need to eat three four eight times a day you have to calculate that is breakfast lunch and dinner blue snacks + r9 + or 24 hours food all around and that never stop ship kitchens run 24/7 manned by a culinary team of more than a thousand people they dish out over 30,000 meals every single day and they do it all from compact kitchens on a rocking ship so how does all this food make it to the plate we'll start on the loading dock on a Saturday this is turnaround day when all new food is delivered to deck - this is basically a place that you would not like to be on on turnaround Eve and we are loading it's busy busy super busy that's jarett he orders food for the ship's 23 different restaurants every week Jared's got a 1 million dollar shopping budget all of that is just for seven days of food sometimes Jarrett will tweak his orders based on who's coming aboard more kids means more chicken fingers that's how the operation runs so we monitor it on a daily basis what has been used what has not been used and then we adjust our orders accordingly but by and large being in Miami having the same number of people it's almost the same every cruise on turnaround day 30 trucks arrive at Miami port they're carrying 500 pallets worth of inventory and all that has to be loaded onto the ship by 4:00 p.m. any delay in our operation can hamper the sail away of the ship which is again a big logistic requirement over 600,000 pounds of food and drinks are provisioned for just one week of sailing once on board everything is moved along the ship's secret Highway this is i-95 and it runs the entire length of the ship on deck 2 we separate all the stores to the different location that you are supposed to go we have about 20 different storerooms divided into freezers fridges walking fridges and rice stores seafood meat vegetables and fruit are all divided and stored in separate fridges if you come towards the end of the cruise this box will be almost empty with a few fruits that are needed for two more days which we keep as backup stock there are also six freezers that's where the 700 pounds of ice cream that will be eaten each week are stored dry goods are stored down on deck one full of spices full of chocolate in the storeroom coffee is nice to be in the storeroom in an elevator gets the food downstairs Jared's team checks all of the food for quality control every day if produce is ripening faster than expected they try to work it into another meal for example overripe broccoli could go into broccoli cheddar soup instead of being tossed once inventory is stored restaurants on upper decks put in food orders with Jarrett chefs will come downstairs pick up their order and cart it away to be cooked that's where this guy comes in any food unball this beautiful shape everything you really it's my responsibility wherever you have beautiful potato fries it's my rice is my pate is my paste is my Sala shrink whatever you IDI is my responsibility Rijo steam of 280 chefs run the kitchens 24/7 each chef works ten to twelve hour days contracts typically last four months without a single day off some of the people start to working for 800 in the morning all the way to 2 o'clock take a break I'm back I can fire claw feeling by night Terry they another group they start to work in tango friend and I all the way to 10 Oakland demony so we cover day and night productions chefs on board cook up nearly a hundred different menus every week all the menus are developed at Royal Caribbean's Miami headquarters and every week chefs stick to the same rotation of menus cooking up everything from racks of lamb to hand rolled sushi the it has to be diverse to match Symphony of the Seas international passengers vacationing at all kinds of price points we try to please everybody optimist with everybody to find what you're looking for all the cooking happens in 36 kitchens we're galleys as they're called on the ship there are 12 specialty restaurants onboard costing up to $50 a person and each of those restaurants has its own small galley in those tight quarters chef's crank out the same menu every day a Jamie's Italian it's fresh pasta at hooked it's over two thousand oysters shucked per cruise but the largest amount of food is reserved for the main dining room which spans three decks and serves up to six thousand people a night eating here is included in your ticket before food heads up to the main galleys it starts in one of the prep kitchens off i-95 there's a butcher shop what da good morning these are the gentlemen looking after all the meat gods the butcher goes through about 15,000 pounds of beef and nine thousand seven hundred pounds of chicken each week there's also a veggie cutting room and a fish sawing box lobster is the most popular dish in Maine dining the ship goes through about 2,100 pounds of lobster tails every week finally the food heads upstairs to the main galley the ship's biggest kitchen is broken down by categories desserts bread cold food and hot food and dessert chefs whip up cakes chocolates and a hundred different types of pastries over in the bread bakery they make 40 different kinds of bread from all over the world all from scratch but the real hustle comes just before the dinner rush six thousand hungry passengers in the main dining room remember Rico before dinner prep starts he has to approve all the dishes Rico tries each dish and gives his critiques [Music] chef's take his notes and get cooking chefs can see a tally of each dish ordered up on screens the system also keeps track of how much inventory is used in the cold room salads and appetizers like carpaccio come together in the hot room chefs dish out soups sauces sides and mains plating up chefs on a stove poking so everything we do is sleep batch cooking so basically let's take there we pass it over to the pass the person on the pass is planing it out to the requested temperature their meats always that the guests are getting fresh food and all the operational point we don't have any other products finally waiters deliver those dishes hungry passengers out in main dining between the chef's inventory crew waiters and dishwashers it takes a team of 1085 people to keep this massive operation going together they cook nearly 11 million meals each year and they're doing it all on a moving ship the ship is rocking then all the equipment is billed to the ship rocking and in whatever moment maybe the ship move somebody don't put one break in one in one trolley and you see the trolley fly-in away and happen that's why all the cooks always be the attention with that but if crew members are doing their job right passengers won't even know any of it's happening they'll just get back to eating their eighth meal of the day

Channel: Business Insider

Views: 11,436,592

Rating: 4.8986654 out of 5

Keywords: Business Insider, Business News, cruise ship, Royal Caribbean, Symphony of the Seas, Cruise, Puerto Rico, San Juan, 30000 meals, food, meals, dining, ship kitchens, ship, galleys

Id: R2vXbFp5C9o

Length: 7min 53sec (473 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 18 2020

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[u/ktoner1017]

And that's only about 80 plates. They have a long way to go.

[u/Solo4077]

Thats just my point of view... i used to cook. Lets say for an event of 400 people i had one person help me.. no kitchen just 4 tables. A conventional oven.. out in the open sometimes and deal with it.. if ur not in the cooking industry it looks amazingly hard i dont know. Now a days you can get just about everything pre cut pre peeled ect ect. Dont get me wrong i will love to be partnof something like that ... but want to be amazed just hit the busy restaurant in your town on a Friday night and watch the line cooks ... its a beautiful thing... hey im bored sorry for my coment any way have a wonderful day night...

[u/human-aftera11]

That’s not sustainable. I wonder how much is wasted and dumped in the ocean. Cruise ships look like an eco nightmare.

[u/EsKetchup]

Cruise ships are disgusting

[u/manikdeprez]

Who cares cruise is for limited capacity brains who can’t figure how to visit a foreign place without having everything handed in a “package”