Australian Army Catering Corps

The Australian Army Catering Corps (AACC) is the corps within the Australian Army that is responsible for preparing and serving of meals. The corps was established on 12 March 1943.

History The feeding of the soldier was and still is a unit commander's responsibility. Historically, unit feeding was dependent upon foraging in the enemy's territory, the baggage train being as small as possible. If a commander failed in his task, his company merely melted away. Cause and effect were apparent.

Before and During World War One In the early days of the Australian Army cooks were drawn from the ranks of a Regiment. Unfortunately the kitchen was used as a dumping ground for the problem soldiers, rarely did a soldier of any quality or ability volunteer for this despised trade. The quality of the food produced by these regimental cooks can be best summarized by the infamous World War I catch cry "Who called the cook a bastard?" the retort being "Who called the bastard a cook?"

World War I saw the introduction of new style of fighting on the battlefields, trench warfare. Soldiers fighting in the trenches were given hot meals, when possible, under the cover of darkness, during the day they fended for themselves and ate bully beef and biscuits and contrary to all the stories being passed down, they were also provided cheese, jam and bread. When relieved from the trenches soldiers were fed hot meals in the rest areas at the rear. The legend of Bully Beef and Biscuits was born.

Camp kitchens, towed on a horse drawn cart often had to be sited well behind the trenches, as the smoke from the woodfires would attract artillery attention. Soldiers were often awarded bravery medals simply for being able to deliver rations to the frontline, in the difficult and often impassable terrain under fire.

1920's and 1930's - Interwar Period In between the two World Wars the feeding of the peacetime Militia or Citizens Military Forces (CMF) at their brief annual camps did little to enhance the reputation of Army cooks or food. Feeding in these camps came to depend upon the employment of civilian cooks (shearers' cooks etc.) who were well paid and their general lack of culinary skills fixed firmly in the minds of the officers and men the concept that the cook was a deplorable necessity. The Militia soldier was reared on this idea, and accepted indifferent feeding as one of the least attractive aspects of military life.

At the outbreak of World War II the reputation of the unit cook was still at an all time low. Qualified Cookery Instructors, members of the Australian Instructional Corps were running cookery courses, however only the worst soldiers of the regiment were being offered up for training. Despite the fact that these courses were run continuously as soon as the men had completed their cooks training they returned to their former duties as a rifleman, driver etc. It was rare for a qualified chef or catering tradesperson to volunteer because of the low status accorded to them.

1940's - World War Two and Formation of the Corps In July 1939 Sir Cedric Stanton Hicks, a prominent Professor of Human Physiology and Pharmacology at the University of Adelaide was appointed the District Catering Supervisor of the 4th Military District in Adelaide. This appointment proved to be a peculiar quirk of fate for the Australian Army, as it brought a scientist into direct contact with the feeding problems at its most important point, the kitchen. He took practical steps to ensure that the essential nutrients were included in the ration scales and were retained throughout the cooking process to be consumed by the soldier.

Hicks noted that the Cookery Schools were having a very difficult task trying to train sufficient cooks from the unsuitable personnel offered up by units to provide satisfactory messing in the many training camps which had been established all over Australia. He recognized that to improve the feeding of the Army it was necessary to get good soldiers to be cooks. Improve the standard of cooking equipment used in the field and in barracks, improve the standard of training with a more scientific approach and improve the quality of the rations made available to the soldier.

There is an old Army saying, "It is not what you know, but who you know." This certainly applied to Hicks.Citation? Clarification? His first task was to raise the standard of the cook. He did this by recruiting catering managers direct from the civilian industry. He wrote proposals and gained support to have suitably qualified cooks paid a tradesman rate and to be promoted. Seems normal enough today, consider the opposition at the time though. When the proposal to upgrade suitable trained cooks to the rank of Sergeant and Corporal was circulated one senior officer actually wrote as one of his objections that the presence of these Sergeant Cooks would be embarrassing to the Sergeants Mess.

Through Hick's influence, barracks kitchens were upgraded: a new type of cooker, the static Wiles Steam Cooker, being introduced into the service. After a lot of submissions he and the Wiles family were finally able to persuade the Australian Army to use the Australian designed and built Wiles Mobile Steam Kitchen too. Training was improved and instead of soldiers traveling to Cookery schools mobile training was commenced with cookery instructors going to the units. Ration scales were improved through the introduction of additional commodities selected for their nutritional value.

In 1942 Hicks, now a Lieutenant Colonel, put up a proposal to form the Australian Army Catering Corps. As expected there was initially considerable opposition, however eventually this was approved and on 12 March 1943 the Australian Army Catering Corps was raised with Sir C. Stanton Hicks as its first Director of Catering.

Hick's philosophy for the formation of the Corps then and it remains true today is "The primary function of the Catering Corps is to ensure the most efficient use of rations and through that provide the maximum health and stamina to the troops." Out of this philosophy the Corps got its motto "We Sustain". The AACC is a service that provides an extension of the Commander's power to discharge in detail his/her responsibility for the feeding of the soldier. AACC personnel are first and foremost members of the unit they are posted to. Catering personnel are "detached", not "attached".

With the formation of the Catering Corps the shortage of cooks was reduced. At the conclusion of World War II the AACC Corps strength was 17,600 cooks.

After World War II the Army downsized and what was known as the Interim Army came into being. In 1948 the Directorate of Catering was disbanded and the Catering Corps came under the control of the Directorate of Supplies and Transport the Royal Australian Army Service Corps. This was considered a retrograde step as the supplier of all the rations in effect technically dictated catering policy to the cooks, customer satisfaction was guaranteed, as it was difficult to complain about quality etc. to your superiors. The biggest task for the AACC at this time was providing catering staff to serve in Japan with the British Commonwealth Occupation Force (BOCF).

1950's - Korea War and Malaya Emergency With the outbreak of hostilities with the Korean War, the men from BOCF were the first to go. As they did their time in that theatre they were rotated back through Japan. The British Army also set up a Cookery School at Kure in Japan and many Australian soldiers completed their basic training there.

Whilst in Korea the cooks of the Australian Army worked under extreme climatic conditions, it was either very hot or very cold; their kitchens were normally just tents and in the main units were mobile. The front could change several times in a week. They operated with the same field cooking equipment used during World War II with some improvisation because of the lack of solid fuel (firewood). Where possible these cooks swapped or stole modern cooking equipment from the Americans. Rations for Australian soldiers were a mixture of American and British, a large percentage being canned. During this period the Australian Army again expanded, the AACC re-enlisted many cooks who saw service during World War II. Another source of manpower for the AACC was former Army Catering Corps cooks from the British Army who transferred over direct.

During the 1950s in Australia a large amount of the Army's resources were directed toward the training of conscripts. The myth of Army cooking continued, one still hears the tales of how they sat in foxholes and only had bully beef and hard tack biscuits to eat on Puckapunyal Range.

At the conclusion of the fighting in Korea Australian soldiers were then sent to Malaya for the Emergency. This was a much sought after posting by all soldiers because they were able to take their families with them and in a lot of cases their standard of living was higher than they would have experienced back in Australia. Up to this period the Australian soldier had not been a very adventurous eater, but here in Malaya they developed a taste for curries and some Chinese cuisine. Naturally the unit cooks learnt how to prepare these dishes and on their return to Australia they passed this new skill on the other members of the Corps.

During the 1950s and 1960s basic cookery training was conducted in Trade Training Centres, which were situated in most capital cities. These centres were under the control of the RAASC and also trained drivers, clerks and store men. All advanced training for AACC Corporals and above was conducted at the RAASC Centre at Puckapunyal. All training kitchens were modified ex-World War II buildings not suitable for the task, however, full credit must be given to the instructors of the day - despite this, they achieved excellent results. The early 1960s heralded a new era for the AACC; during this period many new kitchens and messes were being built with modern up to date cooking equipment. It was a period where the AACC stopped teaching their basic cooks how to kill and pluck a chicken and gone were the days of shelling wheat bags of fresh peas, deep freezers were issued and so were frozen chickens and quick frozen peas.

It was during this era that Australians became more food conscious, no doubt influenced by the influx of migrants and tourists. TV was now in Australian homes, Graham Kerr the super chef was the in show and suddenly the cook had an elevation in status. Soldiers enlisting now wanted to be cooks, they were better educated and most importantly they were motivated. In the early 1960s the AACC were issued with the new US patent M37 Range Fuel Cooking Outfits and the Range Outfit Field Gasoline and the Immersion Heaters. Compared with the Hydra-burners, the Wiles Steam Cookers, Soya stoves and the Flower stoves this equipment was the state of the art. Interesting to note though that this was the very same equipment that cooks borrowed or stole from the Americans in Korea back in the early 1950s. At about this time the famous Wiles Steam Kitchens were retired from Service.

1960's - Confrontation in Borneo and Vietnam War In mid-1960 Australian soldiers were sent to Borneo for what was known as the Confrontation. This proved to be a lead up for the Army and the AACC in its preparation for South Vietnam and the Vietnam War. Also in the mid-1960s National Service was reintroduced, this time for a two-year period. To train these soldiers who were allocated to the AACC old Army barracks were converted to training kitchens at Bonegilla, Victoria. This temporary facility trained 400 National Servicemen as cooks a year and remained in operation for a period of 10 years.