Optimal Cooks to prisoners ratio?

[BonaFide]

I have around 110 prisoners and 20 chefs with access to about 24 cookers and 24 fridges in 2 kitchens with 2 canteens. This is also with 10 prisoners helping in each kitchen for about 5 hours a day. Essentially there are 40 people working in the 2 kitchens for the 2nd meal. They cant make enough meals for 2 sittings a day.

[Sirkular]

If they can't make enough meals it's probably because you don't have enough cookers to cook all the food needed. I am fairly sure you have enough cooks though. 40 cooks to 24 cookers is the problem there I think.

[GC13]

Originally posted by BonaFide:

in 2 kitchens

There is your problem. Right now the AI doesn't know how to handle multiple kitchens and workshops. With workshops it's fine: put them right next to one another, and there will be relatively low efficiency loss from them moving between workshops.

Kitchens are a whole other story. A workshop will have prisoners standing at their machine for forty-five seconds to a minute at a time, while chefs are always moving. Plus, I don't see much of a point in making a second kitchen just to put it right next to the first...

I go with one cook and cooker per sixteen prisoners, meaning I'd only have seven cooks on your setup. I never assign prisoners to the kitchen, and they still get enough food for two meals a day on medium quantity.

[fidelio]

right now the game does a poor job managing multiple canteens. a ratio of 20 prisoners to 1 chef is about all you need even without any prison kitchen workers, but that's with an efficient design utilizing a single kitchen.

currently with multiples there seems to be a lot of carrying stuff back and forth between them, wasting tons of time, and creating confusion everywhere.

try eliminating one of your kitchens and canteen combos (including the equipment) and see what happens.

[jamesc70]

2 Cooks can feed 32 prisoners in 2 eating sessions a day; one early 1 hour, and one late 2 hour eat session. I also schedule an hour of free time after eating, so the stragglers finish up; not sure how important that is to the 2/32 ratio.

For 110 prisoners, you need no more than 7+2 cooks. This is assuming a few things though - you have enough tables so when the food is available, there are spots to sit. Your cooks have a fast and easy way to deliveries - straight line, fast tiles, less congested path. The extra (+2) cooks are to help with delivery pickups, since when you have alot of cookers/freezers, food deliveries will be coming often.

[BonaFide]

I made 2 smaller canteens and kitchens to avoid having 110 prisoners sitting in one area. So for example if one area starts rioting then it wouldnt affect the entire prison population. I guess the game hasnt caught up to my thought process.

[GC13]

The ability to do this is planned but not implemented.

We're all waiting for it, believe me.

[SuwinTzi]

Currently in Alpha 19 seems that having 2 kitchens isn't too much of a bad thing, I'm scared to try having 2 canteen with separate kitchens.

I have 2 kitchens with one canteen, 1 literally built inside the canteen and don't have too much issues with efficiency.

A ratio of 2 cooks, 2 cookers, 1 fridge works well, and sinks only factor in after meals are done; not a problem if you split meal times in two.

1 serving table serves 80 meals, 1 cook provides 20 meals, 4 cooks per serving table.

Longer meal times help too, currently I have 2 chow times, morning and night, lasting 3 hours each. Feeds my 350 prisoners pretty well.

[tomatoes.dll]

The problem I'm having is that I start out with a small prison, then either have to build a second, then third, etc. kitchen in various new wings, or basically redesign the center of my prison if multiple kitchens and canteens is a problem. How does one work around this issue?

[Al-Bundy]

Multiple kitchens and canteens is working now, was fixed in a previous alpha ;)

[Old Roy]

On the PA Introversion forums, I had a discussion about this regarding a fairly large (600-ish) prison. I had multiple rooms of varying types and was informed that certain rooms are no good to duplicate - but it takes the prisoners SOoooo long to reach even a centralized kitchen/canteen/shower/etc that I've begged the devs to invoke some prioritizing in the AI (i.e. use nearest to assigned cell).

Hopefully we'll get that one day. Until then, discovering the "proper ratios" of services to prisoners is part of the challenge / fun of the game. Discovery and all that. It will be what makes you an awesome Warden, while I remain a silly one.

[Smashing]

Until they introduce a feature to stop people assigned to certain jobs going to any room rather than the closest, your best bet is to plan your entire prison around a central area where things like Kitchens, canteens, workshops and the laundry will go. For the kitchen at present you should just build a single MASSIVE kitchen with canteens coming off it. Prisoners will go to the nearest canteen it seems but cooks won't work within one kitchen.

[NitroZark]

Originally posted by tomatoes.dll:

The problem I'm having is that I start out with a small prison, then either have to build a second, then third, etc. kitchen in various new wings, or basically redesign the center of my prison if multiple kitchens and canteens is a problem. How does one work around this issue?

Well, at the current time I go for a central canteen/kitchen. When I start a new prison, I plan for the expansion of the kitchen/canteen so I'll be able to grow it later (though, usually this means moving some other rooms such as forestry, staffroom, offices...) to make space, but that's easy.

[Automator]

ive found a helpful tip in serving large numbers of inmates. Create a separate regime for a security level you are not currently housing. (i have all max so i use mid)
set the mid regime to eat 2 hours before the actual meal time. This will cause the cooks to start preparing much earlier and give you a jump on the cooking and preparation of meals... hope this helps someone