The menu is made for the 85,000 meals that will be dished out at Yukon College during the Canada Winter Games next February.

Arrangements are underway to import between 40 and 50 culinary arts students and their instructors from other colleges and universities to assist local culinary staff and students at the venue for the athletes' village.

The existing cafeteria will be fitted with enough steam tables and other serving centres to push through up to 1,800 athletes and coaches for each meal, in three waves of 600 or so.

Two and half days before participants arrive, the college library will be stripped to the bone and converted into a dining room large enough to seat 700.

'It is going to be busy,' says Gene Batten, the college's co-ordinator of culinary arts and manager of cafeteria services. 'What we want to make sure is that we have fun with it, that we enjoy it.'

Batten, who also co-chairs the Canada Games Committee looking after food service for the athletes' village, says the 15 days of Games present a great learning opportunity.

In addition to the help that's expected to arrive from Outside post-secondary schools, the local committee has been in discussion with the Department of Education to explore opportunities for local secondary students enrolled in food service programs.

Batten says the menu has gone through a nutritional and dietary analysis. Once final approval has been received from the Games organization, it will be final, and the receipts will be locked in, with no opportunity for deviation.

The analysis of the menu, the chef explains, is based on those receipts. It's imperative athletes and other participants eating at the college know what is in a particular sauce or soup, in case they have a food allergy.

By finalizing the menu well in advance of the Games, it also provides the host society's sponsorship committee with an opportunity to approach major distributors with in-kind contributions of food supplies, says Stu MacKay, the college's dean of professional studies and team leader for the village venue.

He notes Batten and another man will soon be off to a major Edmonton food show, where they'll be able to make contacts.

Already, MacKay points out, G-P Distributing, the local arm of the national distributor, Grocery People, has jumped on board.

There is, after all, ample room for food suppliers to join in when you consider the 4,000 pounds of Toupe ham required, the 6,750 litres of milk chocolate, skim and 2% and the boxes and boxes of pre-mixed, pasteurized scrambled egg mix, just for starters. Sorry no sunny-side up, or over-easy.

The deans insists, however, the quality of the food will have nothing to do with the level of sponsorship dinner will be served, no question.

'Our goal will be to provide as high a quality product as we can for the athletes,' says MacKay. 'We will deliver a high-calibre menu.'

All the baking will be done at the college.

Entrees will be either roasted, steamed or cooked. Nothing will be deep-fried.

Village residents will have a choice of two entrees at each meal. If they'd like something different still, there'll be pasta, salad, lunch meat and fruit bars fully stocked.

The variety of food bars will be kept fresh from sun-up to sun down.

'We call it all-day grazing,' MacKay jokes.

As a means of keeping a handle on waste, portions will be fixed, though athletes will be able to return for seconds as many times as they like.

MacKay says controlling the servings is a means of reducing the amount of food that ends up in the garbage.

Batten says the kitchen space is more than ample. It was built large enough to fulfill the requirements of an emergency shelter, as the college has been designated a primary safe site by the Emergency Measures Organization.

MacKay said some equipment needs to be replaced as a matter of routine, and the government has agreed to do it in advance of the Games. It's also agreed to buy a couple of pieces of equipment not there now, but will be handy come next February.

Even with seven walk-in freezers, the volume of food required over the two weeks is so great it will require storage trailers outside the kitchen.

MacKay says the use of biodegradable cutlery is also being considered, as an environmentally-friendly initiative. It's amazing how well some of the disposable cutlery on the market these days decomposes, he says, though questions remain around costs and efficiency.

'We are going to be preparing a lot of food, and we are going to be working hard but we are going to be having fun,' Batten reiterates.

Down at the Gadzoosdaa Student Residence, head chef Gord Parton is equally confident in his staff's ability to provide for the 100 members of the cultural contingent who will grace the Games.

Normally home to 38 high school students from around the territory, Gadzoosdaa will host 75 performers and cultural ambassadors, while another 25 will be staying close by the Teen Parent Centre, but eating at the student residence.

Parton's menu has also been finalized, for the same reasons up at the athletes' village.

Lunch on the first Friday of the first nine-day rotation consists of tomato Italian soup, chicken la king as the entree, and rice pilaf as the starch. Supper time on day seven will consist of chicken noodle soup, beef stroganoff, pasta and peas and carrots.

Breakfast is a little more standardized: bacon or ham; pancakes one day, French toast or waffles the next; hashbrowns, scrambled eggs, and an assortment of hot and cold cereals available every morning.

Parton says there's a need for some flexibility in the kitchen, however.

'They are going to be bringing us some cultural food, like seal and a little bit of muskox, and that sort of stuff.

'There's going to be a lot of Arctic char.'

Parton says he's never cooked seal, but has been assured they'll provide a recipe, or even someone to cook it for them.

'At our end, it is going to be much more flexible than at the college, because they are feeding everybody there.'

Having experienced cooking for the 1992 Arctic Winter Games in Whitehorse, Parton said he and his staff are not at all bothered by the prospect of feeding almost three times as many people every day.

'We are set to handle it,' says the head chef. 'We can handle it, easy.'