Staff Meals as an Employee Perk

A conversation from the old forum:

When I was a breakfast chef at a B&B in Austin, the owner had me serve a breakfast buffet. I’m not a great believer of hot breakfast buffets because this type of service invariably results in food wastage – but this is a subject for another post.

We almost always had bacon, sausage, eggs, and fried potatoes left over – but the owner turned these leftovers into a staff perk. Staff who came to work on time could start their day with breakfast, “on the house.”

Depending upon what we had left over from the staff breakfast, I could chop bacon, sausage, and fried potatoes; add cheese, salsa, and refried beans, and roll the mixture in flour tortillas. The resulting burritos were then served to the staff for lunch.

The staff meals were wonderful. They helped the staff bond. They reduced the amount of time that an employee would otherwise have taken off for lunch since employees without sack lunches would have had to leave the B&B to go to a restaurant. They were a nice perk since hungry employees were always punctual.

The B&B stocked sodas for guests. As the breakfast chef I also baked cookies for our guests. The staff was always allowed to have a complimentary soda with lunch and with the permission of the owner, I was always pleased to share freshly baked cookies with my co-workers.

As an innkeeper/owner, I would been pleased to continue this practice except for the fact that my housekeeper doesn’t eat lunch. (Lunch is frequently offered and is just as frequently declined since my housekeeper would prefer to work through lunch so as to finish her job and go home a hour earlier).

Since she doesn’t eat lunch, I occasionally make supper for her to take home and share with her family. I also have no problem with letting her leave early if all housekeeping tasks have been completed for the day.