Energy use and management in production of entrées in hospital food service systems

Energy required for process stages of production of beef loaves was determined for five simulated hospital food service systems. Three were on-premise systems: conventional, cook/chill, and cook/freeze. Two were assembly/serve systems: thaw/heat/serve and heat/serve. Meters were used to monitor actual energy consumed by gas and electrically operated equipment. Data were converted to BTUs. Apportioned energy, a derivative of actual energy, was based on percentage of usable equipment space occupied by the beef loaves. Theoretical energy was calculated on the basis of temperature change, product mass, and heat capacity. Results varied according to the measure used, but the cook/chill and cook/freeze systems required more energy than the conventional system regardless of the measure used. From data obtained in this exploratory study, however, there is no basis for saying that any one system minimizes energy use. Additional research should include all stages of processing and effects of increasing volume and using equipment to capacity.