Narrator: This is Akshaya Patra,
the world's largest free-school-meal program.
This kitchen alone makes enough biryani
for 75,000 children daily.
Across India, the foundation's 65 kitchens
serve 2 million children every day
in over 19,000 schools,
and has served over 3 billion meals
since its inception in 2000,
something which Vice Chairman
Sri Chanchalapathi Dasa is very proud of.
Chanchalapathi: It's like feeding all of India three times.
Narrator: We visited a mega kitchen
to see how they make vegetable biryani
and moong dal payasam
in such big batches.
This mega kitchen is located in Bangalore,
the capital of India's southern Karnataka state,
and staffs 230 workers across three floors.
We start on the top floor,
where all of the food is cleaned,
cut,
and prepped.
Every day, workers prepare
the following day's raw ingredients
and then store the food in a cold room
that can hold up to 5 tons of food.
Shridhar Venkat: On an average day,
we use about 25 ingredients in this kitchen,
and one very important aspect in Akshaya Patra
is the menu design.
Narrator: Today's menu includes vegetable biryani,
an Indian rice dish that the kitchen prepares
with a mix of vegetables and a house blend of spices.
Workers begin by running the crates
of prepped vegetables through these cutting machines.
So, because we are preparing large quantity of food
and we have to do it very quickly
and we have to do it very cost-efficiently,
we extensively use a lot of technology.
Narrator: This batch of biryani contains tomatoes,
green peppers,
cabbage,
carrots,
potatoes,
and squash.
Shridhar: If you look at these crates,
every meal which goes to a child
at least has minimum 50 gram of vegetable
for a primary-school child
and 75 gram of vegetables
for an upper-primary-school child.
Narrator: Alongside the vegetables, workers also portion
and prepare rice for this dish.
The rice is then washed thoroughly
with water before it's cooked.
On an average day, the kitchen can handle
about 7 tons of grains and 5 tons of dairy.
The washed rice and precut vegetables then move
through a chute that connects to the second floor.
This simple use of gravity is one of the key components
of this facility, as it reduces the amount
of manual labor and keeps things clean.
The ingredients land into 51
of these stainless-steel cauldrons,
where the cooks use massive stirrers
to mix everything together.
Workers then close the lids and utilize a 2-ton boiler
that generates steam to cook the food.
Shridhar: So, biryani takes typically an hour to make,
right from preprocessing to finishing it,
and the cauldron, which you see here,
can feed about 1,000 children.
Narrator: For food safety and cleanliness,
the vegetable biryani is temperature-checked and logged.
And next to each cauldron,
a small stainless-steel vessel stores a sample
of each batch, which is then tested
24 hours later for microbial growth.
Once a week, children receive their lunchtime meal
with a sweet treat.
Shridhar: And here, moong dal payasam is being made.
Moong dal payasam is a dessert,
and children love dessert, being youngsters.
So, each of these cauldrons can handle
about 1,200 liters of dal, or lentils.
Narrator: 1,500 pounds of lentils drop down
into each of the six cauldrons used to cook the dish.
Milk and raisins are also added for texture and creaminess.
Finally, jaggery syrup, which is an unrefined
natural sweetener made from sugarcane,
gets stirred in to the cauldrons.
Shridhar: Typically, moong dal payasam takes about
1½ hours to one hour 45 minutes,
right from boiling the moong dal
till the final dessert is made.
Narrator: Once the vegetable biryani
and moong dal payasam are finished cooking,
workers transfer the dishes
from the cauldrons into these carts,
which are then taken to another large chute
that connects to the ground floor.
The food drops down, then gets portioned
and packed into individual vessels for distribution.
Shridhar: These are food-grade vessels.
Each of the vessels can handle
food for about 85 to 100 children,
and one of the important cornerstones
of Akshaya Patra is hygiene and safety.
So, you can see, each vessel
where food is going to be stored
is getting washed or cleansed with steam.
Narrator: Then they're passed down a conveyor belt
and get loaded onto Akshaya Patra's custom-built buses,
called "buses of hope."
Shridhar: These are insulated vehicles
which keep the food warm.
Large quantity of food goes in each vehicle.
Over a period of time,
Akshaya Patra has developed logistics ability.
So, for example, from this kitchen,
we have about 32 vehicles.
We handle about close to 650 schools,
and we are feeding about 75,000 children every day,
though the end-all strength is about 110,000 children.
Narrator: And that is just a single kitchen.
When you include the 64 other locations across India,
they feed over 2 million children daily.
Chanchalapathi: It had a very modest beginning.
We started serving 1,500 children
in the outskirts of Bangalore city in the year 2000,
and gradually, we saw there were more and more requests
from the headmasters of the schools,
who would write to us and say,
"We see your vehicle carrying food
pass in front of our school.
Can you please stop and feed our children?"
And when we saw these requests,
we kept increasing and scaling up our program,
and that's how, today, in Bangalore city,
we serve about 200,000 children.
Narrator: So, how does Akshaya Patra get its funds
to pay for all of the free food they provide?
Chanchalapathi: So, we get a certain amount
of support from the government.
We top it up with some more money
that we raise from individuals and foundation
to ensure that the meal we give to the children
is hot, nutritious, safe, tasty,
so that children are delighted to have a meal at noontime.
Narrator: Today, they serve 19,000 schools
across 14 states
and two union territories in India.
Kitchen staff will create menus based
on the students' preferences and feedback by area.
For example, Akshaya Patra's kitchens
in northern Indian regions can expect foods
like roti or flatbreads.
In southern India, rice is more widely eaten
as a staple food,
and the children love the rice-based dishes
prepared by the foundation.
Shridhar: Another important aspect of Akshaya Patra is
we want to give what otherwise
their mothers will give to them
if they're at home and the mothers had resources.
Of course, no one can replace a mother,
but Akshaya Patra tries to come as close
to what a mother can cook.
Chanchalapathi: You know, you cannot run a big program
of this kind in a mechanical, official manner.
All of the personnel involved in the Akshaya Patra program
come with a deep commitment of compassion
and kindness for children,
and so it is that compassion
that keeps us very highly motivated day after day
to see that we do our tasks and duties
with a lot of heart.