Working in a kitchen...

cdilbeck95

Help! I work in a kitchen at a summer camp, and I'm constantly surrounded by food. We have breaks for the meals, and it's so hard to avoid eating the food that I've smelled cooking/helped prepared all day. Especially the desserts!

Any advice on how to not eat at work? I've tried chewing gum, but I go through gum too quickly for it to matter. Breakfast is the biggest problem for me. There's a huge gap between breakfast and lunch where we can eat. On my better days I have a bowl of yogurt and fruit, but sometimes the smell of french toast is just too much. Lunch isn't a problem because we get let off right after the dishes and there's no time to eat, and the same for dinner.

Supertact

Self control, learn it.

kmp0511

I completely understand what you are going through. I'm a cook in a work camp in Alberta. It's just a small camp so I'm the only one in the kitchen but I do three meals a day and have to keep the men supplied in baked goods. So beside the coffeemaker is always a stack of brownies, cookies, cakes etc. Not to mention after the men are done eating I have to throw out all the leftovers. It kills me to see food go to waste so there I am picking at the leftover breakfast sandwiches or bacon. It's horrible and such a struggle!
Unfortunately I haven't found a solution other then self control and trying to keep reaching for the healthy food. Some days I do better then others and I try not to beat myself up about the bad days. I gained over twenty pounds in the first few months at this job.
Now I'm working at losing almost 100lbs and I know this fall when the camp picks up again I'll be struggling with the same issues. I just try to stay positive and keep active. I log everything I eat so even if its a really bad day I still have to be accountable to myself for it.
Best of Luck!

dbmata

My first career was working my way up from a cook to a sous chef. Being surrounded by all that good food was great at first, and hard to properly handle, but by the third week of doubles, I got really tired of what we had.

Don't pick up bad habits, like eating from the line, tasting too much, or the real killer: replacing water with soda. It's going to take some self control, you'll get through it.

tigersword

Wait, you chew gum in a kitchen? That's horrible (very unsanitary.)

It's quite simple. Eat what you can eat based on your calorie allotment. I've worked in restaurants most of my life, and my weight gain actually happened when I got out of food service.