Production and Holding Problems in Quantity Cooking

Appears in
Professional Cooking
Professional Cooking

By Wayne Gisslen

Published 2014

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We have emphasized throughout this chapter that vegetables should be cooked as close as possible to serving time. They lose quality rapidly when held in a steam table.
In quantity cooking, however, it is rarely possible to cook individual vegetable portions to order. After 20–30 minutes at steam table temperatures, even carefully prepared vegetables are usually overcooked.

Two systems have been devised to help solve this problem. Batch cooking is especially well suited to set meal service, and the blanch-and-chill method is most helpful in extended meal service. Needs vary from institution to institution, and you will probably find both techniques useful in one kitchen.