The team of cooks in the school cafeteria at Mikoláš Aleš Elementary School in Zlín prepares around 530 lunches a day served to pupils and school staff. Some children also come here for morning snacks. The newly renovated kitchen uses, among other things, three Blue Vision combi ovens, which have fully replaced electric ovens.

Who makes the menu?

I put it together and the principal approves it.

How many types of lunch do you cook?

Twice a week we cook two types, and as part of that we try to include meatless and healthy meals that the children are not yet very used to. Otherwise, we cook one lunch.

So what are the most popular dishes?

Tomato sauce with meatballs and pasta, schnitzels, spaghetti with minced meat, meatloaf, chicken with paprika. These are classic Czech dishes.

What do you use Retigo combi ovens for?

We cook both yeast and potato dumplings in them. We bake meat and cakes in them. We cook rice and eggs. We actually use them for everything; we no longer have classic electric ovens.

Do you use other programs besides baking and steaming?

Yes, grilling. We grill salmon, for example. We just made 140 kg of roasted potatoes. We roasted them in thirds, and it took the one cook the whole morning to prepare them. When we make sweet yeast dumplings in the combi oven, we use 35 kg of flour. It's also time-consuming to prepare everything; we start at around half past four. But then we set the combi oven program and don't have to worry about anything else. It's not like it used to be, when the dumplings were prepared in a pot and had to be turned, removed, and pierced. And we are extremely satisfied with the result. The dumplings are beautiful. 

What function or feature do you appreciate the most?

It's the ease of use. You prepare the food, put it in the combi oven, set the program and time, and you don't have to worry about it. Whether it's the dumplings I mentioned or even rice.

Do you customize the programs yourself?

We use some of the preset programs, for example for grilling salmon. But in most cases, we customize them a lot as we've gradually figured things out.

Would you recommend Retigo to other school canteen?

I would definitely recommend them. We're happy with them. Considering that they're running at full capacity every day, they don't break down. 

Věra Kordulová, 

head chef