Why Have A Kitchen In A Church?
Churches aren’t places that you would normally associate with kitchens, but a church kitchen serves several important purposes making it beneficial for both the congregation and the wider community.
1. Community Building
One of the primary functions of a community church is to build community. This is where a kitchen and the ability to provide hot food help to bring people together. The church can host meals and tea mornings, or provide food after a service, etc... Shared meals promote a sense of togetherness and support. It is possible to do this without a kitchen, but the time and money saved by not having to bring food in is invaluable.
2. Charity
Kitchens in churches can be central to giving charity and outreach to the vulnerable, a place to prepare food for community service, i.e. feeding the homeless or providing meals during difficult times like after a funeral or during a crisis. Not only is it easier to care for those in need when the church has its own kitchen, but it also expands the opportunity of taking in volunteers who can get involved and help prepare and serve meals.
3. Bringing People In
A church with a fully working kitchen can also become a centre for attracting those who maybe wouldn’t normally visit a church; they might come for cooking classes and health workshops, it can also be a good tool for teaching children and families about nutrition and meal planning.
4. Education
A kitchen can be central to the educational aspect of the ministry. Think of Sunday school, youth group meetings, special services or any community/educational/social group & gathering that might need a place to meet where refreshments or meals are required. Why not consider the church as the place to come together?
Why A Commercial Kitchen?
Some churches already have kitchens in place but they tend to be domestic kitchens. What do we mean by this? A kitchen that is more akin to the kind you would find in a house rather than the type you see in restaurants. It may seem slightly over-professional for a church but actually, here are some very good and compelling reasons to swap the domestic for the commercial:
- Durability and Longevity: Churches don’t have a lot of funds and having to regularly replace equipment can be costly. Church commercial kitchen equipment is built to last so you can rely on it to work as hard as you need it to.
- Higher Capacity: You can choose equipment that is designed for larger operations: ovens that can prepare 50+ portions in one go, hot holding that will keep pre-prepared food warm for hours, and fridges and freezers that can store large quantities of ingredients.
- Saving Time: Church commercial kitchen equipment is built for speed. Not only does bulk cooking save time but intelligent programmable equipment like combi ovens can cook by themselves meaning you don’t always need lots of staff to prepare a hot meal. Ranges & fryers heat up and recover faster than domestic ones
- Consistency: Professional-grade church kitchen equipment is designed for precise temperature control and consistent cooking results ensuring that dishes come out the same way every time.
- Advanced Features & Technology: Many commercial kitchen appliances come with specialised features that are not available in domestic models. Ovens can have automatic cleaning cycles whereas high-powered commercial ventilation systems remove heat and steam efficiently while commercial dishwashers often have cycles designed for faster turnaround.
- Safety Standards: Because of strict health and safety regulations in commercial kitchens, the equipment is designed with more robust safety features.
- Energy Efficiency: It may seem more expensive but professional equipment operates more efficiently in terms of energy use compared to domestic appliances.
- Space Optimisation: A common feature of churches is that they are old listed buildings so putting in a new kitchen can be a challenge: uneven walls, small rooms, peculiar layouts. However, with bespoke furniture and slim-line equipment, it is easier to create custom layouts that optimise space for efficiency creating the ideal workflow, essential to a smooth operation.
- Maintenance and Support: Due to the high reliance that restaurants have on their equipment compared to domestic customers, commercial equipment usually comes with better support, warranties, and service options.
Featured Products
CALL US: 0121 816 0301
Why choose Kitchen Solutions?
Here at Kitchen Solutions we have and continue to work regularly to ensure that no matter the shape of the building the church will have a fully functional, safe and efficient kitchen to provide food to their congregation and to support their events. From coffee machines to high-speed ovens, water boilers to grills, refrigeration, warewashing and ventilation we design a kitchen that is fit for purpose, budget and operation. To give an example of the difficulty that church buildings can provide here is a real drawing below for a church in Tamworth where we installed a kitchen. It doesn’t matter what the space is like, if a church needs a kitchen we will install it! Needless to say, this is now in full operation fulfilling exactly all the purposes a church kitchen should be providing.
What Equipment Would We recommend?
Of course, every kitchen is different but there are definitely commonalities to certainly kitchens that benefit from particular pieces of equipment. There are a few items that we would recommend for church kitchens: Lincat water boiler, e.g. an EB3FX to keep the teas and coffees flowing. A Merrychef High-Speed Oven E1S or Connex 12 for a regular stream of toasties, sausage rolls etc. For larger operations that require full hot meal catering, we’d recommend a Retigo combi oven like the O 623i Plus. These ovens are highly specced and come with long warranties. We provide full training on High-Speed Ovens and Combis so that these powerful machines get used to their full potential.
If you need help with your kitchen church to ensure it is space optimised or if you are unsure which equipment would best suit your needs, please get in touch https://www.kitchensolutions.co.uk/pages/contact-us
