Feeding the five thousand at the Games

Catering for the 5,000 athletes arriving in Manchester from 72 countries in July 2002 for the XVII Commonwealth Games will be a huge 24-hour operation. The dining facilities in the Commonwealth Games Village will seat 1,800 people at any one sitting and will be capable of producing 2,000 meals per hour. On average, 14,000 meals will be prepared each day - enough to keep the average family going for five years!

The athletes’ cultural and dietary needs have to be carefully considered and a selection of up to 10 main dishes will be offered at every meal including pasta, rice, soup and fish. Over the period of the Games, approximately 300,000 meals will be prepared. Some of the items on the enormous shopping list include:

• 90,000 eggs



• 20,000 litres of milk



• 300,000 pieces of fruit



• 1,840 kgs of lettuce



• 11,600 kgs of mushrooms



• 365 kgs of raisins



• 25,000 kgs of cheese

Each athlete will consume 4.8 litres of liquid a day so a million 600ml bottles of water are needed. To ensure athletes get enough carbohydrate, 7,000 kgs of rice and 8,000 kgs of pasta will be served and 5,500 kgs of seafood, 8,600 kgs of beef and 6,800 kgs of poultry guarantee they get their protein intake. To flavour the food, a staggering 100 kgs of garlic is required and 30 km of aluminium foil is needed to cook it. Also on the shopping list are 1 million napkins.

Commenting on the catering challenge, David Payne, the Commonwealth Games Catering Manager said: “It is crucial that athletes receive the right foods at the right time to ensure they achieve peak performance. High-energy sports competitors, for example, will need to eat between 2 - 5am. All dishes will carry nutritional information to help athletes select the right foods for them, and symbols for different food types will be used to help non-English speaking competitors make the right choice.”

Apart from the main dining area, other facilities such as juice stations, ice cream stalls and barbeques will be available to give the athletes choice and variety.