The production and service of meals to older 

individuals is, in reality, a food service business 

and must be operated as such. A food service 

business is a complex organization, and food 

service operations can be difficult for someone 

not trained or experienced in food services to 

understand.

WHAT DO YOU NEED TO KNOW?

Food quality is a critical component of a 

contemporary senior nutrition programs. As the 

baby boomers age and become participants in 

the congregate and home delivered nutrition 

programs, participant quality standards will 

evolve. Both quality of the meals offered and 

the yield from the purchased product to make 

these meals, need to be considered in order 

to attract program participants and meet the 

competition that is entering the market to provide 

meals for older individuals. Home delivered 

and congregate nutrition programs for older 

individuals may be provided by an agency which 

offers multiple services to older individuals in 

addition to nutrition. As a result management of 

the nutrition programs may be just one area of 

a person’s administrative responsibilities, and 

this person may or may not have a background 

or experience in food service operations. For 

program managers and staff without specific 

food service training, this handout provides 

a summary of basic aspects of food service 

management that are critical for all senior 

nutrition programs.

WHAT IS A FOOD SERVICE SYSTEM?

A food service business is a system comprised 

of multiple integrated components. For a food 

service to be successful, attention must be given 

to the activities incorporated into each of the 

system components. The following components 

represent a flow of product from where it is 

purchased to when it is served to a program 

participant:

Procurement

Successful product procurement, or purchasing, 

means having a purchasing process in place 

that leads to the program having the right quality 

of the right product being received at the right 

place at the right time.

Receiving

Product receiving should be done only by a 

person designated to have that responsibility. 

This person must know about food/food 

products and be trained in proper receiving 

procedures for foods and supplies.

Storage

An adequate amount of dry, refrigerated, and 

frozen storage is needed to maintain product 

quality and prevent product loss from spoilage 

or theft. How each item is dated, placed within 

the storage area and the temperatures at which 

is it stored, are important factors in maintaining 

product quality.

Production

Planning for food product production should 

be done at least a day prior to the day the food 

is to be produced in the kitchen. Standardized 

recipes are needed for all menu items prepared 

in the production kitchen. Once items are 

prepared, they must be held at an appropriate 

temperature until needed for packaging or 

serving.

Serving

Portion control is a critical factor when 

serving food or dishing food into meal trays 

for packaging. Without good portion control, 

the meals served may or may not meet the 

nutritional requirements for meals for older 

individuals. Meal costs are also affected when 

portion control is not monitored carefully. The 

kitchen could end up with left-over product for 

which they have no use. Left-overs frequently 

become food waste which adds to meal costs 

without providing any food to anyone.

The National

Resource Center on

Nutrition & Aging

Procurement, Receiving, Storage, Production, Serving & Transportation

Food Service Basics For Non-Food

Service Program Managers And Staff

One-Page Summary
Transportation

Whether food is to be transported in bulk 

(e.g., not portioned into individual meals) to 

congregate sites or as individual meals for home 

delivered meal clients, the food must be packed 

into appropriate transport equipment. Food 

might also be transported in various types of 

containers that will heat or chill the foods using 

the transport vehicles electrical system during 

the transportation time.

The importance of maintaining high standards 

for food safety and sanitation at each step in the 

food service system cannot be over-emphasized. 

Senior nutrition programs are preparing meals 

that are frequently served to a population that 

is at high risk for complications from food borne 

illness. Many older individuals are immune 

compromised or have an increased risk for 

illness and do not have the physical reserves to 

“bounce back” from an incidence of foodborne 

illness. Programs need to operate their food 

services in accord with the United States Food 

Code food safety and sanitation standards or in 

accord with their state standards when the state 

standards do not match with the Federal Food 

Code.

WHY IS ATTENTION TO FOOD SAFETY 

AND SANITATION CRITICAL TO YOUR 

PROGRAM’S SUCCESS?

Food service organizations are complex systems 

comprised of multiple components that must

be well integrated if the food service is to be 

a success. To be effective, senior nutrition 

programs must recognize that they are food 

service businesses to ensure that their programs 

can be effective, optimize available financial and 

human resources in order to thrive. Appropriate 

food handling limits the risk of foodborne illness 

among program participants and mitigates 

potential outbreaks that can prove catastrophic 

for a senior nutrition program in terms of legal 

liability, and ruin a program’s reputation within 

the community. 

Today, for-profit businesses are entering the 

market of providing meals for older individuals. 

These entities generally provide only a meal to 

their “customer” (the program participant) via a 

delivery service, resulting in their ability to offer 

competitively priced meals, often lower than that 

of most programs. It is more important than ever 

that senior nutrition programs are operated as 

an efficient, cost-effective food service business 

that will be competitive in the marketplace. 

Managers and staff with management 

responsibilities relative to the programs’ food 

service operations should take advantage of 

every opportunity to learn about the food service 

industry and the operation of a food service 

business.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

Foodservice Director. CSP Business Media, L.L.C. 1 Tower Lane, Suite 2000, Oakbrook Terrace, IL 60181. 

Phone: 630-574-5075. http://www.foodservicedirector.com.

Gregoire, M. P. Food Service Organizations: A Managerial and Systems Approach (8th Edition). 

Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2013.

National Restaurant Association. ServSafe. http://www.servsafe.com/home

United States Food and Drug Administration. Food Code 2017. 

https://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceRegulation/RetailFoodProtection/FoodCode/ucm595139.htm

Written by: Audrey C. McCool, EdD, RD, FADA. Commissioned by the NRCNA.