Hi Everyone,

Haven't been on here for a while as I have been very very busy at the Olympic Rowing Village based at Holloway University, Egham Surrey.

Cooking for the athletes themselves has been trying, and there is not much scope for individual flair, as all the recipes are printed out and must be adhered to according to the dieticians for proteins/carbs/calories etc, which was actually a bit boring to be honest.

However, when all the athletes went home, I was transferred down to the "Workforce" Kitchen, which means catering for all the Police/Admin Staff/Security Staff etc etc etc and what a difference this has turned out to be

Basically, they give you a meat menu, a vegetarian menu and veggie menus to cook for the workforce night and day as it's a 24 hour operation. Luckily I have managed to secure the early shift, which means getting up at 3.30am every morning and starting at 5am. We get breakfast on the go and serve at 6am, then we start preparing fro lunch.

Normally, what they print out and what ingredients come down from the warehouse are 2 totally different things, so we end up making something out of whatever we have got. But, there is usually a hell of a lot of meat and a very good range of spices, but, unfortunately no methi leaves!! lol

So they have been chucking like 30kg of either Chicken/Lamb etc to me and said, make something with that!!

So the first day, I made a Chicken Korma (no base sauce) just put something together from scratch and it went so quickly, the exec chef called down for another 20kg chicken and we had to make another batch so quickly to cover the lunchtime covers of 250 people. The vegetarian menu only used 1 tray and the other 5 ended up being thrown in the bin lol.

After this, they have allowed me to prepare a base sauce, and this past week have prepared bathfull's of curry which is going down a storm here

But alas, it's all coming to an end now. I have been asked to stay on for the Paralympics and as of Sunday will be back up in the main kitchen preparing the boring stuff once again.

But I have managed to catch a few pictures of the curries I have been able to make down in the workforce kitchens

I've got to say, this has been a once in a lifetime experience which I shall never forget

Just to give you an idea, these cookers are about 4 feet long x 2 feet wide x 2 feet deep......

Chicken Korma


Base Sauce


Lamb Marinating in yogurt, tomato and spices


Vegetable Madras


Lamb Rogan Josh

Really great stuff Bob - what an experience! Quite an accomplishment.

So Bob, the big question..... Did you put the same amount of spice mix in that big tub as for a single portion??!

(maybe I'm "stirring it"!!!)

Quote from: rallim on August 23, 2012, 01:47 AM
Well done Bob, you deserve a gold medal for that wonderful display and effort 

Amen to that.


Simply fantastic Bob!

Quote from: natterjak on August 22, 2012, 09:45 PM
So Bob, the big question..... Did you put the same amount of spice mix in that big tub as for a single portion??!

(maybe I'm "stirring it"!!!)

Hi Chris,

When cooking with this type of quantity, it's difficult to know how much you are going to need. I therefore made a very large container of spice mix, put in what I thought would be enough and carried out the same method as I would for a single portion at home. Oil, G&G, spice mix, chilli etc, tomato paste, base sauce etc etc and built the curry up from there.

During the cooking process we obviously tasted and adjusted season and or spices to suit