San Diego is now home to the U.S. military’s largest mess hall.
The Marine Corps Recruit Depot adjacent to San Diego International Airport downtown has just opened a massive, 100,000-square-foot dining facility—now officially the largest in the entire U.S. Department of Defense.
According to a report by the San Diego Union-Tribune, the new building can serve up to 20,000 meals per day to recruits in training. The ultra-modern kitchen is packed with heavy-duty industrial gear, featuring walk-in ovens, 80-gallon kettles, and massive food-processing conveyors. To put that scale into perspective, those conveyors cooked more than 2,000 pieces of catfish for lunch on Wednesday alone.
The Marines say all that food is critical, as recruits burn a whopping 4,000 to 5,000 calories a day. That intense energy requirement is largely because they are constantly on the run and carrying heavy gear, regularly covering more than 12 miles a day on foot.
(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Adrian Estrada)