"Hospital Food" Topic

Is there anything worse than hospital food? I'm with my daughter in the hospital for four days and I tried some of her ravioli and it had not one iota of flavor to it. My wife's grilled chicken looked like it had been boiled in water. Ugg!

When I was in this April all I could stand was the jello and the fruit – everything was TOO flavorful and strongly scented… the smell of the rice pilaf or the mushrooms on the chicken made me (more) nauseous.

Cost in excess of $10,000, and nearly died, and they never did identify what I had…:(

Tell me about it. I probably had about 40 meals in hospitals in the last couple of months. The food is almost always terrible. If they get anything right it is breakfast.

The one hospital that has good food consistently is the Medical College of Virginia hospital in Richmond. They have a Chik-Fil-A.

St. Francis, Beech Grove in Indianapolis had a pretty good waffle thing going on where you could get them to make a strawberry waffle after midnight.

There was one hospital I went to in Flint, Mi where the hamburgers had the consistency of spam. It was really weird. They didn't taste as bad as they felt, but they tasted pretty bad.

Methodist hospital in Indy is pretty terrible for food too. I almost always ended up with a hamburger there. I tried to go with the beef strogonoff at Riley one time I was over there, big mistake.

The chanciest thing I ever did was get the spaghetti at Parkview in Ft. Wayne, In. Never get spaghetti at a hospital.

While Chik-Fil-A is tough to beat, Deaconess hospital in Evansville, In, has a really neat restaurant down the street. The place is called Munchies and it has this kick ass sandwich called a chicken Blah-blah. you can easily walk to Munchies from the hospital. The place looks pretty dirty and a little dodgy, honestly, but it is difficult to beat that sandwich with all the ingredients mixing and doing magical things to each other.

I haven't been in hospital for 20 years. But the food in NZ hospitals is pretty good as I recall.

When I worked at Presbyterian hospital in Oklahoma City in early 1980 the food was okay. Could be that time has erased the memories though.

Having had family in both of the major hospitals in this area (Carolinas Medical Center and Presbyterian), they come across as slightly below average restaurant food. Given how bad hospital food is generally supposed to be, that's actually pretty good :) CMC used to have a lemon cake that was absolutely to die for, or at least get really sick for anyway…

Is there anything worse than hospital food?

I like hospital food, but then I like most food.
-Kle.

University of Nebraska Medical Center hospital, in Omaha, NE, had very good food as I found out during my recent stays. I was surprised that I could order food off a menu any time during the day or night and could order it for my wife while she was visiting with me in the room. The anytime was surprising because when I told the nurse I was hungry at 4 am, after 24 hours of not eating and surgery, she ordered me a meal, be it was all liquid it was very good. My breakfast was even better. Both were delivered within 20 minutes.

I could order ala cart or a meal(breakfast, lunch etc)off the menu.

terry

I was in hospital last year for a few days and the food (once I was allowed to eat it) was lovely! Well done the NHS!

Pete

I worked in a local hospital as a porter a few years ago, delivering the food in metal or plastic carts up to the floors for the nurses to distribute, and then bringing them down to the kitchen again for cleaning. The fare really depends on the cooks, but also on who's running the department. I can tell you that most of the food that was shipped to us, whether fresh, frozen, canned, or packaged, was quality stuff.

A sampling of what we served at my hospital was King Ranch chicken, beef stew, broccoli au gratin, turkey pot pie, hot tuna casserole, and the like. Also, there were selections from the grill, like char-broiled burgers and chicken, not to mention a fresh salad and fruit bar. Like Klebert said, I'll eat just about anything, including "hospital food", which seems to generally improve in taste and content.

I'd comment, but with no sense of smell, my food is always pretty bland.

RAF Hospitals in the 50s gave each 'bed' patient a bottle of beer a day.

Hospital food is better than no food at all, I'll give it that. And bully for the NHS for getting something right!

Airline and hospital food seems on a par.
Generally OK but a little bland.

I agree that it is hard to mess up breakfast. Even at a hospital.

They had a McDonald's inside the hospital and I learned to like Snack Wraps.

You don't go to hospital to enjoy yourselves.

You are there to suffer.

If it was pleasant you would not want to leave.

Had some breakfast in a local hospital cafeteria. Not bad for the $5 USD or so spent. I had an appointment later that same day. But when was a patient atthat hospital in March of '08, the food was edible,but smaller sized. Fortunately,there was a menu to pick from for the next days.

German hospitals still serve beer. My wargaming buddy who lived in Germany for many years was instructed by his surgeon, on the night before his op, to have two beers before bed!