Working With Hospitals and Aged Care Providers
Community Chef is a local government-owned, social enterprise that provides high quality meals at affordable prices for people who are nutritionally at risk.
The organisation has a uniquely informed and valuable perspective on the challenges of delivering high-quality, nutritious meals to the elderly and frail, to people with a disability, to hospital patients and to residents in aged care facilities. It was formed as a direct outcome of concerns expressed by all levels of government, about long-term food security for nutritionally at risk residents and the failure of the private market to provide suitable meal quality and variety at affordable prices. In a ground-breaking solution that resolved the critical issue of the level of financial investment required by individual councils to address the issues, 13 municipalities formed the joint venture Regional Kitchen Pty Ltd. This drove the development and construction of a state-of-the-art food production facility in Altona – the only one of its kind in Australia – that is now leased to Community Chef for the development and production of nutritious, varied, low-cost meals for residents throughout Victoria.
The kitchen opened in December 2010. Today it prepares and delivers more than 100,000 meals a month, including five hospitals and three aged care facilities in Melbourne and rural and regional Victoria.
Community Chef is leading the way in providing nutritious meal options at affordable prices for people requiring care.
Community Chef Menus and Meals:
Quality and Value are Paramount
Community Chef’s evolving and expanding product menu offers lunch, dinner and snack options. Importantly the service is highly flexible tailoring options to provide lines to supplement in-house production or designing menus to meet specific needs.
Our full range currently comprises 54 soups, 244 mains, 39 side vegetable options, 78 main salads, 3 side salads, 91 desserts and 41 sandwich varieties. The product offering is seasonally rotated, four times per year, and has a four-week rotated cycle in each season. There is a 30 day shelf-life for most items, excluding sandwiches, salads and some cold desserts. Customers are spoilt for choice with our range including food to suit preferences for Anglo-Australia meals, Roasts, International cuisine, Vegetarian and Asian palates, Salads and Sandwiches. Special and complex dietary needs can be fully catered for, including texture modified meals and diabetic, low fat, low salt, high fibre and low protein meals. Halal, Kosher and gluten-free meals are offered through third party suppliers.
Special and complex dietary needs can be fully catered for, including texture modified meals and diabetic, low fat, low salt, high fibre and low protein meals are offered. All special diet meals are clearly and appropriately coded.
All meal components are available as individual or as bulk serves. Each and every Community Chef meal is carefully developed to meet, or exceed, government standards for the provision of energy, vitamins, proteins and minerals and the nutritional balance of all meals is independently verified. Community Chef works hand in glove with Leading Nutrition, a specialist dietetics group, on all stages of the menu development process, senior chefs are involved at each stage of the production process and a dedicated research and development chef regularly visits customer sites.
In terms of guaranteed supply in the event of an emergency, Community Chef is party to a reciprocal contingency arrangement with two Victorian hospital super kitchens and an interstate commercial supplier.
Community Chef and Environmental Benefits
Care providers working with Community Chef know they are purchasing superior meals that are prepared and processed in a facility that utilises cutting-edge technology to maximise efficiencies and environmental benefits, including passive and active energy saving systems and water saving systems. Meal packaging is recyclable and meals are delivered in returnable crates.
Community Chef’s passion is to provide healthy and appealing food for the nutritionally at risk; food that meal recipients enjoy and truly want to eat.
Care providers are welcome to arrange a tour of Community Chef’s award-winning Altona facility and have a taste-testing.
For details, or to discuss the specific business benefits of joining Community Chef, call us on (03) 9368 5900 or contact us.