…That is how the galley on the ‘Utrecht’ was also called.
Coal pit.
The ship still had an oil-fired stove and the day watch (04.00 – 08.00 hr), also known as the ‘eating watch’, always had to light it.
This required a certain technique, if you failed in this, a large cloud of soot would form in the galley.
The galley fan could not handle that and before this cloud had once subsided, the cook was already walking around in despair.
Even a newly constructed fan could not change anything about this misery.
From my logbook of operations.
Sometimes it was so bad that there were black dots in the bread.
Sometimes the cooker turned on but the temperature was too low in the oven and then we had completely different breads.
Despite the persistent attempts of cook and boys it never became clean.
It remained a dark hole.
Leave a Reply