Food Service

Just completed my first week in food service.  Quite an adventure.

They want me to work from 7 AM to 5 PM.  I get there at 9.  Before prison I showed up two hours late and was paid $16 an hour plus expenses.  Two hours late is about the max I can pull off or I'll get thrown in jail.

My first day they pulled a power-washer into the kitchen.  I was instructed to power-wash all the grout lines in the tile floor.  I was told to do this while they were prepping food to serve on trays for lunch.  Overspray from cleaning chemicals, soap and bleach were contaminating food areas.  We were told to power-wash the area around the prep table for the coleslaw.  I shook my head as I watched the overspray go across cooking surfaces.

About noon the food service director came to me and pulled me into his office.  He briefed me on OSHA regulations.  I have to wear boots at all times and wear a hair net around food.  OK.

The chow hall also has a lady who is free-world that oversees how much food is put on each tray.  She makes sure the employees don't steal all the food being prepared to serve.  She has to stand guard because a piece of chicken sells for $2 and they steal all of them they can.  They can be as much as 150 pieces short on chicken night.

The thing I observed is she stands over the serving line and prep area and refuses to wear a hair net.  It would mess up her hair and we can't have that.  So---don't take a job in food service!

My first manner of business was to write up the unsanitary way they clean.  Cleaning on the level they ask us to should be done after regular feeding hours when food is put away in coolers. Not during scheduled feeding.  Florida Department of Health mandates the same rules in D.O.C. as they do in free-world dining.  This kitchen is clearly in violation of clean cooking areas and sanitary work stations.

I've filed a formal grievance against the kitchen on behalf of myself and all other inmates who unknowingly are eating cleaning chemicals on their food.

Next, I wrote up the free-world inspector for not wearing a protective hair net or gloves when handling food.  This is a direct violation of food and health requirements for public food service.  So, while I'm in this kitchen we're going to get things in tip-top-shape.  Or they're going to fire me.

Getting them in compliance will better our dining experience.  Pissing them off will get me fired.  Either way it's a win-win situation.

Instead of giving me a simple job change they will probably lie on me and lock me up in confinement.  Whenever you write grievances in prison this can happen as a result.  That's why you never write up officers.  I never do that. 

I'm writing up food-service and the free-world employees.  They are breaking rules and not being held accountable.  I don't want to work under those conditions.  I eat  that food.  As long as I don't know there is cleaning products in it, then I eat it unknowingly.  However, you put me in there to work and I see it all day, I don't want to eat like that.

It's possible they will just lock me up for some small infraction because I have thrown a rock at the hornets nest.

That's how it works.  Its a 50/50 gamble but I had to do this.


That begins my first week in the kitchen.