Spending much of your adolescence dining in a school cafeteria is one of those shared experiences of the human condition. Those who make and serve the food are sometimes affectionately known as the “lunch ladies” — people who don hairnets and serve ice cream scooper-portioned food onto plastic trays. For Brenda Pappas, who cooks at Lenihan Intermediate School, 212 W. Ingledue St., making and prepping meals for 700 plus fifth and sixth graders and faculty each day requires the discipline of a ship’s captain.

“We are always working a day ahead. You prep for the next day because you don’t have time to do all the cooking and the prep for the same day,” Pappas said. “That way, we can pull food out of the freezer or refrigerator and cook it, while at same time, prepping for the next day.”

And the pattern repeats — Monday through Friday.

Pappas has worked at Lenihan for two years. She began as a food server then became a cook three months into the job. Her focus is cooking the hot lunch items. She said she enjoys the hours, working in a school setting and getting to start each day fresh with new tasks to complete.

T-R PHOTO BY SARA JORDAN-HEINTZ Pappas said she works a day ahead on food prepping. She uses a notebook where she’s documented what brands have what servings to them and how to cook them, to save time.

“I had always been in accounting — in an office job — and commuted to Des Moines every day and got burnt out,” she said. “I took eight months off and decided I was bored. I had a friend who worked in food service at Lenihan and suggested I apply, so I did.”

Pappas arrives to school at 6:45 a.m. Breakfast is served at 8 a.m. for around 200-300 people.

“First you sanitize the work area and prep for breakfast,” she said. “There is always one hot breakfast item and some alternatives, plus fruit.”

Lenihan serves five lunches: 10:50 a.m., 11:40 a.m., 12:10 p.m., 12:40 p.m. and 1:15 p.m.

When it’s all said and done, 700-740 people will have been served lunch in about 2-1/2 hours.

One hot lunch meal consists of mozzarella sticks and marinara sauce, with an option of cheesy taco burgers. Cold lunch items are always available, such as deli sandwiches, wraps and salads.

“For this meal, the day before, I get the sticks on pans and put them in the freezer so they’re ready to bake the next day, and I thaw out the taco meat,” she said. “The day of, I mix the seasoning and water with the meat, steam it and put it in the warmer (to await serving).”

Meal supplies arrive to the kitchen twice a week. Pappas said it can be challenging to know how much food to prepare each day to ensure they don’t run out and don’t allow things to go to waste.

“It’s difficult because we have a main dish and an alternative. If you served that meal weeks ago, you can try to gauge the numbers based on that, but you never know what the kids will take, then you’re scrambling to go to the freezer and get more product, pan it up and get it out there,” she said.

The kitchen team consists of hot and cold food cooks, servers and dishwashers. Each month, a menu is posted to students and staff. However, Pappas prefers to focus on only a week at a time for planning purposes. Because her shift ends at 2 p.m., multitasking is the law of the land.

At the end of the day, she has to tabulate how many servings were taken of the main dish, the alternate dish and the hot vegetable, and what leftovers there may be.

“Cooking in bulk was a challenge at first, but it’s totally different than you cooking at home. It’s much easier, even though it’s a large quantity, if you understand your numbers and know how the food comes packaged and how many servings are in a bag and fit on a pan,” she said. “It was a good challenge. I made myself a whole notebook of notes on what brands have what servings to them and how I cook it, and I still refer to it every day.”

Lenihan has one of the busiest kitchens in the Marshalltown School District. Pappas said the elementary schools only offer cold breakfast items, and those are prepped and packaged in the Lenihan kitchen. Marshalltown High School’s kitchen does those schools’ hot lunch prep. The kitchens in the school district that are classified as “production kitchens” are Lenihan, Miller Middle School and MHS. Lenihan’s kitchen is also where all the free summer breakfast and lunches will be made, then sent out to the feeding stations.

“I will be working through the summer cooking those meals,” she said.

Striving each day to serve quality meals and keep her numbers balanced motivates her.

“I like to cook, but I find myself cooking less and less at home,” Pappas said with a laugh.