Yesterday I went to the cannery. Dave and Kelley had volunteered their wives to go. Nice! No I didn't mind at all. I've always had a fascination with assembly lines, conveyor belts, the show "how it's made" and Mr. Rogers field trips to the factory to see where stuff comes from! Fascinating! I guess that's just how my simple brain works. I also haven't been for a while so I was good to go.
I picked up Earlene bright and early...well snowy and early. We were the only one's there when it was time to start, so we got the orientation. dressed in our aprons, gloves and lovely hairnets and were taken to our assignment. The smell that filled the air was unmistakable mushroom!
I got to be the one to regulate the filling of the cans. (Oh we were making cream of mushroom soup) This really nice man was teaching me how to run the machine that works the soup dispensing and the conveyor belt that moves the cans along. I think he could tell I was a little panicked when I saw the rate the cans flew by me. I had visions of Lucy eating the chocolates and shoving them down her blouse because she couldn't keep up with the boxing of the candy. He showed me a big red button that said STOP and said that I could use that if I got in a pickle. Then he showed me what to do if the cans got stuck, and how to keep the big tub filled to the right level with soup. O.K. I can do this. So then when everything was flowing along nicely, he left me.
It was really pretty easy, there was even a stool for me to sit on while I watched the cans fill nicely with the steamy soup, then chug along their way to get their lids.
Then I noticed the soup was coming out really runny! It was just like watery milk with mushrooms floating on top and it was splatting all over the place. I started waving like crazy at the guy who had trained me...he was clear in the back of the place. He started walking over, not in any particular hurry, so I figured he knew what was going on. When he got there he could see how runny it was and explained that they had lowered the temperature 1 degree on the soup and that had made it come out all runny. It has something to do with the temperature that the starch starts to work or something. He assured me that it would thicken up when they cooked it. I didn't like the way it looked at all. The mushrooms were floating on the top and it looked like watery milk. Then another guy that works there came over and looked at it and he didn't like it either. Oh by this time, Kelley had gotten there....(snowed out at work again), and he was working with Brian on the mixing and cooking of the soup. The guy must have told them to turn up the heat on that next batch cause it started coming out thick...really thick. It was so thick that it would pile up in the can like Ketchup. I started waving at the guy again. Ok. So now it's too thick! The guy went over and talked to Kelley and Brian...come to find out they had got to chatting and the temperature had gone up from 151 degrees to 191 degrees! It was only supposed to go up 1 or 2!
Well they got that straightened out and before long the soup started coming out this lovely shade of creamy white, and the perfect consistency. I looked over at Kelley and Brian and gave them a big thumbs up. Kelley came over to talk to me and I told him that was the perfect batch! He just kind of giggled and walked away. He didn't tell me till later that they had forgot to put the mushrooms in that batch. HA!
The time went by pretty fast. I only had one major disaster on my part. The cans would get stuck every few minutes and I would have to go straighten them out to keep them moving along. Well new people started coming to work and my spot was right by the doors where you enter, so they would all stop and ask me what they should do. I got to talking to this lady for a minute and when I turned around, all the cans were backed up and the soup was just pouring into the big tub...no cans to fill! I got distracted... ok? So I quick straightened them out and got them going along again, but when they got filled, they just stopped moving, with the soup pouring over the top of the can. I tried to push them along, , then actually picked them up and moved them down the conveyor belt, but they still just sat there. I looked around for the helper guy...nowhere to be seen, So I pushed the big red STOP button. AHHHHHHH. That made pretty much everything come to a halt.
The guy came hurrying this time and asked me what was up. I showed him how the cans wouldn't move and he said...Oh when the cans don't come through for a minute, the conveyor rubber pusher alonger thingie pops out of place and you have to put it back to make the cans go. (He didn't say it like that, but thats what I got out of it) He put the rubber thingie back in place and pushed the GO button and everything started flowing again.
Not too long after that the guy came and told me that new people were showing up and he needed to find someplace to put them, so I could go home! HA ! fine... whatever. He was really very nice...said I did a good job and didn't even over flow the tub once!
So we may have produced some less than top quality cream of mushroom soup...sorry bout that. Kelley and I (especially Kelley) may be banned from the cannery for a while.
1 comment:
Wow I am impressed you got to run the machine! When I went we did beans and we had to pull the sticks and leaves out. There were grasshoppers that would jump out of nowhere and on to our laps! It made for quite a time there.
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