Ayotte
A DAY IN THE LIFE of Gilles Ayotte starts at 6 a.m., putting the pot on for 80 gallons of soup. Ayotte has been a cook in the Commons cafeterias for 20 years and is part of the team that prepares three full meals a day for 1,700 students in residence.
Ayotte’s focus is lunch and banquet preparation. When students arrive in September, they try everything, he says. “They like a good roast beef, but their favourites are chicken—Cajun or baked—and lasagna.
Ayotte finds it rewarding to serve all those people every day and enjoys establishing a good rapport with them. There’s a five-week menu cycle, and, he says, “we try to make it appealing for them and to get away from chicken and beef all the time.” But, he adds, they don’t like lamb. “They just see an image of that cute little wooly thing and won’t eat it.”
With lunch starting at 11 a.m., the team estimates the flow so that food is always ready. Along with Ayotte and the lead cook, there are bakers, salad and sandwich cooks and a lot of student workers. “They’re great,” he says. “They’re always willing to do what needs to be done.”
Originally from Quebec, Ayotte moved to Banff at age 20, working in hotels. He was planning to go to California, until he met his wife, who was from Victoria, in Banff. “I never made it to California,” he laughs. Before coming to UVic, he was a cook in several restaurants in the Victoria area.
“We have a good time here in the kitchen, and laugh a lot,” he says of his job. And what we look forward to the most is the 8th and the 23rd!” That would be pay day.
If you would like to participate in this ongoing Day in the Life series, or would like to suggest someone to profile, contact Linda Sproule-Jones at 721-8486 or sproulel@uvic.ca.
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