Cadets have been in the Christmas spirit and enjoying top-notch fare made in the newly upgraded kitchen at Humberside and South Yorkshire Army Cadet Force’s Driffield headquarters.
The RFCA has installed state-of-the-art new equipment and increased the floor space in a £70,000 revamp of the kitchen at the Cadet Training Centre in Driffield.
The aim is to ensure catering staff contracted to provide food at the training centre can cater up to 200 people, the full residential capacity of the centre, in a single sitting.
Some 100 cadets are attending each of the three weekend training camps taking place at the centre in the run-up to Christmas. And, as well as doing their usual training, they’ve been enjoying some Christmas treats too.
Getting into the festive spirit are, left to right, Deyvika Maxted, aged 15, and Zach Blake-Barnard, both from Beverley detachment based at Wolfe Armoury.
“It’s great to be able to have a last training weekend with the whole of A company before we break for Christmas,” said Deyvika who, with Zach, has been with her detachment for 18 months.
“We’ve been doing our usual training but we’ve had Christmas crackers, selection boxes, trees and lights and it’s got everyone in the Christmas spirit.”
Before the new kitchen facilities were installed the catering team could only provide hot meals for around 125 cadets at a time.
“There’s still a little bit more work to do but the aspiration is that we’ll soon have the facilities to provide hot meals to everyone staying here,” said quartermaster Bert Burton.
“The RFCA has done all it can now in terms of ensuring space and equipment. The agreement now needs to be pinned down with the contractors so they sign up to providing more meals when needed for people staying at the centre.”