Spicing things up

Walking around his new kitchen, arms folded over a navy sweater vest, chef Josef Keller sniffs at the air. "Smell that," he says pointing around the expansive space with his nose. "It smells like a restaurant kitchen."

More recognizable in a chef's jacket than his street clothes, the 57-year-old Keller is a Santa Rosa culinary fixture, running longtime white tablecloth restaurants La Provence and Josef's in Santa Rosa. Though he retired from the commercial restaurant business in 2009, there's no doubt the 30-year restaurant veteran knows what a kitchen should smell like.

"Institutional" is exactly what it shouldn't smell like, said Keller, who was asked in January to overhaul the kitchen and menus of one of the largest meal-providers in the county, The Council on Aging's Meals on Wheels program. The massive institutional food preparation and delivery system provides nearly 1,000 meals a day to senior citizens throughout the county.

Keller's challenge: Making the practical, nutritional food of Meals on Wheels more palatable. With a focus on fresh, local foods and an evolving demographic of Baby Boomer seniors joining the donation-based food delivery program, the organization wanted its meals to be more than just sustenance.

That meant cost-efficient, but good quality food with more eye appeal. In other words, food that looked and smelled like it came from a restaurant kitchen rather than an industrial one.

"Institutional food doesn't have to taste bad," Keller said. Walking into the vast food prep and storage hangar that also serves as the county's central emergency kitchen, Keller noticed vats of boiled meat when he entered the kitchen in January.

"They had this huge skillet, and they just used to overcook everything in boiling water," he said with a sigh. "And the recipes were old. There were no spices. That isn't how we do it in a restaurant."

Working with the staff dieticians, the French-trained chef incorporated braising, saut?ng and low-sodium spices like ginger and mustard to add flavor to the meals.

"I told them, &‘As long as you use my name, you have to cook the way I want,'" Keller said.

The menu now has dishes like chicken curry with basmati rice and pineapple, chicken marsala with whole wheat pasta, beef stroganoff with summer squash, pork loin with mustard sauce and seasoned barley or fish with lime and cilantro. There are also traditional favorites like tuna casserole and turkey meatloaf as well as vegetarian meals. The kitchen also prepares specialized meals for dialysis patients for $5 per meal.

Keller said he hopes to expand the program's reach even further by offering a food delivery service to paying customers - affordable comfort food for caregivers, those just out of the hospital, ill spouses or individuals who otherwise don't qualify for the Meals on Wheels program.

With a fixed $2.60 food cost per meal, it's no small challenge to use as much locally sourced and fresh produce as possible, keep meals nutritional and flavorful and on budget (meals cost about $7 to produce).

Keller's work at the Meals on Wheels kitchen has a short shelf life. Once staff is retrained and menus reworked, he'll move on to more local projects.

"I plan to go to schools and hospitals next," he said of his passion for transforming industrial cuisine.

Keller plans to stay on as a spokesman and menu consultant for the Council on Aging.

"How could I not? I'm getting love letters for the food now. Really, love letters!" he said.