Hospital Grub

Audreyfay · May 23, 2004

Of all the hospitals I worked at, only one had food that I enjoyed. Occasionally they'd have a crummy day, but overall it was real good. Employees got a 20% discount and they even had payroll deduction. I ate a lot in the cafeteria back then. And their desserts make my mouth water, even now. They had a cookbook that was available in the giftshop that featured all of there culinary specialties. Several of the recipes I enjoyed making on a regular basis.

Unfortunately, the hospital I work at now, purchases ready-made frozen food from some company. No more specialty recipes. Nothing is "from scratch." I guess it saved money. However, it also compromised the taste. No discount, no payroll deduction. Just pay and pray. I get the food from the cafeteria a maximum of 4x/month. BUT.....they do bake Otis Spunkmeyer cookies daily. MMMMMmmmm...smell great when they're baking!

:)

nurseygrrl, LPN · May 24, 2004

Sad to say, I would not feed our food to my dog, so I always bring my own. Besides, at night, we have no cafeteria service,so it's not a choice anyhow. But having seen and tasted the food from our food service, I still would not spend a DIME on it, period. It's the worst and actually embarasses me that patients get it on their trays. It's also the most frequent complaint we see on our patient satisfaction surveys (surprise). It's sad, because I have worked other places where the cafeteria is so good, people go there for Sunday Brunch!
As far as cost, the employees get no price break ---it can cost about $3. for this lousy meal. Bad deal all around.

Same goes for where I work! Yukk!!

NP2BE · May 24, 2004

I love the food at our cafeteria. There are actually 3 cafterias and a Mcdonalds in our hosiptal. You can geta full meal for 3$ It is a bit repetitive but I bring my lunch sometimes

rollingstone · May 24, 2004

Wife makes me a lunch every day. This is far superior to anything I see my less fortunate colleagues purchase from the cafeteria, especially after hours.

Nurse GOODNIGHT · May 24, 2004

Food is generally very good, but sometimes changes from what is on the telephone (can call in to find out). Get a discount, fairly reasonable. Time getting down to cafeteria a factor. Ordered out a LOT!! with co-workers in addition to going to cafeteria. Once figured spending $$$$ on food, have started to try to take time and plan and bring food. Think you can make healthy choices eating out ANYWHERE and lose weight but it is expensive. Also, we have a service in town which charges outrageously for picking up/delivering from places that do not deliver themselves. Sometimes we rotate and pick a co-worker to go get something special. Figure between 1.00 cokes/pops and snacks spending mega-bucks a year. Most co-workers (myself incl) so busy occ working overtime, life outside work, etc that get off without food for lunch/dinner. Stuck having to order out, but cafeteria has nice stuff.

TiffyRN, BSN, PhD · May 24, 2004

The hospital where I currently work has the cafeteria open from MN to 4am (I'm sure they have day hours but that means nothing to me). We are also connected to a Children's hospital by a kind of skywalk and their cafeteria is open I guess all day until MN. It's quite popular with many of our nurses. The ironic thing is the nurses from the children's hospital will come over the skywalk to buy from OUR cafeteria because they think it's better. Talk about greener grass . . .

There is a discount at our hospital for our employees. The food is OK for cafeteria food. There is also a Burger King and Subway on the hospital property. I usually bring my lunch but I often get a severe carb craving and send a dollar with someone for cookies from Subway. Most of my co-workers are very cool about offering to pick something up for you.

SCRN1 · May 24, 2004

We don't get a lunch break at night where I work, so if I want to grab something to eat while I'm charting or checking off MARs for the next day, I have to bring my own food or get something from a vending machine. This is fine with me because I'd rather only come in for 8 hours than come for 8 1/2 in order to get a lunch break...and the food at our hospital is awful!

DOCS RN · May 24, 2004

No food where I work.

bilingueRN · May 25, 2004

Sad to say, I would not feed our food to my dog, so I always bring my own. Besides, at night, we have no cafeteria service,so it's not a choice anyhow. But having seen and tasted the food from our food service, I still would not spend a DIME on it, period. It's the worst and actually embarasses me that patients get it on their trays. It's also the most frequent complaint we see on our patient satisfaction surveys (surprise). It's sad, because I have worked other places where the cafeteria is so good, people go there for Sunday Brunch!
As far as cost, the employees get no price break ---it can cost about $3. for this lousy meal. Bad deal all around.

The food that they throw on to the tray to serve to our patients is an abomination. I hate the fact that we have to actually make some of them eat it. They complain and I totally sympathize with them. Our dietary dept. has not heard of seasoning and it is the worst food I've ever had. It is worse that Mickey D's.

CHATSDALE · May 25, 2004

we get free meals except breakfast and i almost never eat it----it is absolutely terrible===God bless our poor residents--

Gompers, BSN, RN · May 25, 2004

Always bring my lunch. Even though the cafeteria is open for a few hours on night shift, you never know what you're going to find down there. It's so much cheaper to brown-bag it anyways. We do get a discount if we're wearing our employee badge, but still.

The few times I've eaten in the cafeteria haven't been that great - pretty bland stuff. When they're having special events (like lunch during Nurse's Week) they order out it so it's usually pretty good, even if it's just sandwiches. Don't have much experience with the patient food trays though - I work in NICU so it's all formula and the occassional jar of applesauce, LOL.

I do remember being a patient in another hospital and thinking the food was outstanding. Looking back, I realize I was just starving so any food was heaven to me. I even thought the cream of wheat was delicious. :uhoh3:

zacarias, ASN, RN · May 26, 2004

The few times I've eaten in the cafeteria haven't been that great - pretty bland stuff. QUOTE]
The other week some of the nurses were eating Pho' (vietnamese noodle soup) in the break room and they said they got it from the cafeteria!!! I LOVE pho' but I will go to a real pho' restaurant to eat it, not my hospital's cafeteria! :uhoh21: