Mealtime at any South Valley fire station is an interesting and
delicious affair. The rumors about firefighters are true: They cook
well and eat well, all the time hoping the alarm doesn’t interrupt
the middle of dinner.
Gilroy, Chestnut Station
Though dinner at all the South Valley fire stations is a lively experience with plenty of laughter and teasing, dinner at this station most resembles, in the nicest possible way, a circus act.
“I do a lot of preparation during the day if possible, because you never know how mealtime will go,” said Capt. Joshua Valverde, who is the designated cook this evening. “Sometimes, dinner goes really well, we get to make it and eat it and nothing happens. Sometimes, dinner is impossible. It just depends on the day.”
Sopes, Valverde’s specialty, are on the menu tonight. He is chopping vegetables, heating oil, keeping an eye on the beans simmering on the stove and hunting for lemon pepper spices all at the same time. He calls to Engineer Lani Antonio to come stir the rice for him.
In the meantime, firefighter paramedic Heinz Maibaum, who has been bragging that he’s going to make perfect boiled eggs, is nowhere to be found. His eggs have boiled much longer than he had planned, and no one is sure just how long they’ve actually cooked.
“Where’s Heinz? What’s going on with his eggs? Lani, are you letting my rice burn? You’re supposed to be stirring it,” Valverde says as he scoops tomatoes into a frying pan.
Firefighter Michael Pardini, who is holding plates and silverware, dodges the captain as he turns, swinging around the large cutting board in his hands.
The finished product of all this chaos, however, is a beautiful meal. The silence as everyone lowers their heads and digs in is a high compliment to the captain’s cooking.
Just as the four firefighters are finishing their dinner, the signal sounds and the men raise their heads for a fraction of a second to look at each other. Then they’re up, running for the door, every thought of dinner gone, the focus now on the reported structure fire.
Morgan Hill, El Toro Station
White wisps of smoke curl out of the oven where potatoes are roasting as Capt. Roger Boone stuffs chicken breasts with feta cheese and garlic.
“Oh, don’t pay any attention to that, that’s not smoke,” Boone says, smiling and fanning at the oven with one hand. In his defense, he mentions the oven was cleaned earlier in the day.
Boone is cooking for five men tonight: three firefighters, one paramedic and one EMT.
When everyone gets to work in the morning, someone generally volunteers to cook and everyone pitches in money to pay for dinner, said Mark Schumate, a firefighter engineer paramedic. The crew decides as a group what to have.
“Depending on the meal, we spend anywhere from $6 to $12 per person,” Boone said. “We fit in the shopping when we can, but sometimes we’ll get a call while we’re shopping, so we have to leave everything in the cart at the store and just go.”
It can be frustrating enough when shopping is interrupted, but when dinner itself gets interrupted, some people get cranky, said AMR paramedic Pete Chapa, looking pointedly at his partner, T.J. Lindstrom.
“You won’t do anything all day, and then right as you sit down to eat, boom- we get a call,” said Lindstrom. “It happens all the time, so I got the nickname ‘Locust’ because I started eating my food so fast. I figure if I eat it fast, I can beat the call and I won’t have to go on an empty stomach.”
If a call does come during dinner, the men have 60 seconds to get into the fire engine or ambulance and be on their way to the scene. If the men are cooking, they generally try to cover the food or toss it into the fridge, but sometimes that isn’t possible.
“Everything is rigged so when the alarm goes, the oven and stove and everything automatically turns off so we don’t have to worry about the station burning down,” Boone said. “And if the food is on the table when we get a call, well, that’s what God created microwave ovens for.”
Tonight, no calls interrupt the evening meal, something the crew said came as a pleasant surprise. As they compliment Boone on his cooking, Schumate offers one piece of advice.
“Someone once told me when I was first hired that the only thing that was important when it was your turn to cook was that dinner was hot and there was plenty of it,” he said, smiling. “But I’ve found that’s not always the case. People like it to have a little bit of flavor, too.”
Hollister, Station 2
“You know it’s going to be really good when we set off the smoke detectors,” said Capt. Charlie Bedolla, laughing as he works to prepare dinner at the firehouse.
“Yeah, that’s when dinner is really good,” agrees firefighter Jeff Garringer, nodding.
When the three firefighters on duty Monday night decided to start cooking dinner early, they thought they were being smart. But just as they started preparing the beans and getting out the ingredients for homemade enchiladas, they got a call.
“Sometimes we get interrupted three or four times while we’re trying to make dinner or eat dinner,” Bedolla said. “There are times when we just give up and go out and get something.”
As the men get back to fixing their meal after running the call, they realize it may not be as good as it potentially could be now that the cooking has stopped and restarted.
“The beans may be a little crunchy, but what are you going to do?” Bedolla asks, shrugging his shoulders.
Meal preparation is a true group effort here. As the beans simmer, Engineer Daryk Askew prepares Spanish-style rice, using brown rice. He monitors the rice closely because it seems to dry out faster than white rice, and he doesn’t want it to burn.
“Brown rice is healthy for you and it feels like you’ve got more to chew on,” Askew says as he adds more water to the rice. “We do try to eat healthy whenever we can.”
To make the enchiladas, Bedolla and Garringer work together; Bedolla dunks flour and corn tortillas in a pot of almost-boiling enchilada sauce. He lays it down in the pan, and Garringer scoops filling onto the tortilla and rolls it up, aligning it in the pan.
“Ah, ah- it’s hot,” said Garringer, shaking his hands. “My fingers are getting cooked here.”
Of course, Garringer, who at age 23 is the youngest firefighter present, is stuck with the least desirable job.
As the meal continues to cook, the firefighters help each other set the table, wash dishes and tidy up the massive kitchen, equipped with two sinks, a 6-burner stove, two ovens, two stainless steel refrigerators, an island in the center of the room and a vast expanse of cabinet space.
The finished product is pan after pan of steaming enchiladas, perfectly cooked rice and beans that aren’t in the least bit crunchy. Everything tastes wonderful. But it’s not as good as it could be. The smoke detector never went off.
Sample Dinner Menu for Hollister, Station 2
– Homemade chicken or ground turkey enchiladas in flour or corn tortillas
– Homemade beans
– Spanish-style brown rice
Sample Dinner Menu for Morgan Hill, El Toro Station
– Roasted new potatoes
– Chicken breast stuffed with feta cheese and garlic
– Grilled asparagus and red peppers with garlic and artichoke hearts
Sample Dinner Menu for Gilroy, Chestnut Station
– Homemade pork or chicken sopes
– Spanish-style rice
– Homemade beans
– Tossed salad
