Kitchen/Dining Mechanics

[sitontheedge]

I'm looking for some detailed info on the food preperation and serving system (I've checked the wikis and poked around elsewhere, but haven't found anything good).

For a start, I'm wondering how many kitchen staff+cookers you need to feed how many prisoners. (And does this number vary depending on how long the meal is?)

Next, how much do fridges actually do? How many of those do you need per cooker?

Finally, how much does the number of serving tables matter? (I notice that after a certain point the staff stops filling them. Below a certain point I assume it slows things down not to have 'em.)

I currently am running at 250-300 med. sec. prison. My kitchen is working alright, but despite being huge I seem to be just barely meeting the food requirements of the prisoners. Can a dining hall be too large?

[sitontheedge]

Here's my current setup, BTW: http://oi58.tinypic.com/2zs7g5t.jpg

I just added a bunch more room in the kitchen, hence the empty space.

[BGK]

Not saying I'm holding the absolute truth but usually I put 2 cookers for 1 fridge. As in your current setup I'd double the cookers numbers w/o adding any additional fridges. (and use around 15-20 cooks I guess?)
If you run a 2 hours dinner, using a number of serving tables that can hold at least half of the total number of meals is probably a safe bet.

[BGK]

Well, I am currenlty doing some tests map to see how many guys I can put in the huge holding cell, check my setup, after 45 min I get around 95% of people fed and a huge amount of spare food.

http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/29594956423727225/B6B3BD5B868DB95C7CC9D80CB7DF4626E16A728A/

[sitontheedge]

Originally posted by BGK Linux:

Not saying I'm holding the absolute truth but usually I put 2 cookers for 1 fridge. As in your current setup I'd double the cookers numbers w/o adding any additional fridges. (and use around 15-20 cooks I guess?)
If you run a 2 hours dinner, using a number of serving tables that can hold at least half of the total number of meals is probably a safe bet.

Thanks, that's helpful.

How many meals can a serving table hold? (I'm not sure how to figure out how many will be sufficient for half of the meals.)

[sitontheedge]

Another thing you inadvertently answered for me is whether I need to leave room in front of the cookers in order for cooks to use them. Apparently I do not…

[BGK]

No saying you absolutly need room in front of cookers, but in my case I do actually have a space in front of them:

http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/29594956424269275/3C5F7C3D2CCE684FD612EEA147E6F3AA33684907/

Also, I am not sure how many meals a serving table can hold, but I read somewhere that each slots can hold 20 meals, hence 80 meals per serving tables. I'd recommand some testing though.

[sitontheedge]

Ok, thanks.

So messing around with numbers I now have 24 cooks, plenty of cookers, and 20 serving tables. But my cooks only prepair about 1/3 of the meals I need (not filling the four furthest of the serving tables) and then just stand around until the meal starts.

I'd like to feed everyone in an hour. What can I tweek to get more meals ready in advance?

[donkeronderwater]

In short: Minimise walking time.


The Kitchen
I'm using setups of 1 serving table : 2 cookers : 2 friges
- The biggest improvement was gained by putting them in a line, minimizing the walking distance for the cooks. Especially the distance from the cookers to the serving tables, since the cooks start serving (in the morning) only the hour before dinner time.
- Only use fast walking surfaces. Don't use white tiles for the floor, they are slippery ; )
- Use pathways on the working side of equipment and resonably close to cross the kitchen. Kooks walk faster there, and really slow when crossing equipement. The pathfinding seems to pick the quickest route available.

Canteen __________ Kitchen
Canteen -- [serving]||[cooker][cooker] -- [...]
Canteen -- -------- walking path -------- --
Canteen -- -------- walking path -------- --
Canteen -- [serving]||[cooker][cooker] -- [...]
Canteen -- [serving]||[cooker][cooker] -- [...]
Canteen -- -------- walking path -------- --

I haven't been able to find the optimum for the fridges. Cooks seem to pick a random fridge and cross the kitchen to get there. (maybe just the nearest with the needed ingredient type)
- I would recommend using enough fridges, one per two cookers works, but I try for a 1:1 ratio if I have the space. Enough fridges makes for a bigger stockpile and therefor less need to resuply during cooking. There is a limited time when serving three meals a day. The maximum amount of supplies in the prison seems to relate to the amount of prisoners.
- Placing the kitchen close or at least with a fast route to the delivery area helps. You can secure it by putting a fence around it with a 'remote controlled door' for workers to unload the trucks.
- Serving tables serve up to 80 meals (wiki), then will be refiled if needed, but the biggest bottleneck seems to be to get prisoners past them fast enough.
A table can hold the servings of 4 cookers. (10 meals per pot) But cooks fill the nearest serving tables first, so to spread the meals over more tables place the cookers next to serving tables. Then the meals will be spread out more and faster to reach for the prisoners.

- Placement of the sinks seems less critical, there seems to be enough time to clean everything. I put them in the back or to the side of the kitchen, with the longer walking routes. Not sure about the amount needed, but 1:3 serving tables seems to work.
- Put some garbage bins in the kitchen, cooks dump stuf in it. (At least between cooking sessions.) I usually place a few spread over the kitchen in left over space.


The prisoners side
If you have enough meals available, but problems getting your prissoners to eat properly:
- Minimize walking distance to the canteen by placing it central in the prison, or give them an activity located close to the canteen. (Yard time would work in sitontheedge's picture)
- Create multiple big entrances and use fast walking surfaces both leading to and inside the canteen.
- Give the prisoners 'free time' after dinner. Prisoners who have there food allready will finish eating it. (low green bars to high bars instead of red)
- Place the tables close to the serving tables. You can put the benches back-to-back. Not sure what the influence of the walking space between objects is, but I leave at least 2 squares.
- Place phones inside and the visitors area close to the canteen. Prisoners use eating time for family contacts. Enough phones results in less visitors. Not sure how the choice is made for an individual prissoner, but it seems to work.


@sitontheedge: From your question it seems you have some over capacity and the time limit isn't currently an issue. Then the limited amount of prepaired meals 'might' be a result of the food quality settings. The wiki says high quality produces 3 times the amount of food (ingredients) as produced when on the low quality setting. And you could try to cluster the serving tables with cookers, to spread out the meals over them.

[sitontheedge]

Thanks, Donkeronderwater. That's useful. And good call on the flooring, I don't know what I was thinking putting in flooring that would slow down walking speeds.