Each logging camp employed several cooks and cooks assistants, seeing that it is very time consuming to produce suitable food for 75 to 100 employees. The logging companies fed their employees very well, for a number of reasons: (1) Healthy employees make good employees, and good nutrition helps employees stay healthy; (2) Employees with full stomachs are more likely to be loyal to their employers; (3) Many lumber companies had no labor unions, and well-fed employees are happy employees.

Therefore, most lumber companies provided three hearty meals a day to their employees, and needed several employees to prepare these meals for many employees in an organized and timely fashion. Many times, the cooks and assistants were family members of the loggers that lived in the camps.

If the loggers were close to the camp in the middle of the day, they would come back in for lunch. However, if they were too far to come into the camp to eat, the lunch was taken to them by handcarts on the rail that took them to the worksite. The loggers would gather around the makeshift table, which was set up buffet-style, to get their food, then eat wherever they could find a seat. After the allotted lunch time was over, the cooks and assistants would load the handcar and take everything back to the camp and begin to prepare for the next meal, which would be served at the camp after the loggers came in from the day's work.

Each camp had a dining car that could hold most, if not all of the workers at one time. The car had long tables much like the ones that were found in a cafeteria, and more than likely, the loggers were served cafeteria-style, because that is the fastest way to serve large groups of people in a timely fashion. At the Ritter Company camps, breakfast was served at 6:00am, and dinner was served at 6:20pm, each very promptly so that the cooks and assistants could keep a timely schedule of preparation and cleaning. Each dinner cost approximately 25¢, or about 15 percent of the daily wages. The workers could pay for meals with cash or scrip.

A typical meal would have many choices, and the typical menu would look similar to this 1929 menu:

Breakfast: Corn Flakes; oatmeal; stewed or fried apples; canned peaches; fried ham, pork chops, or beef steak with country gravy; fried potatoes; biscuits; butter, jam, jelly, and syrup; coffee and milk.

Lunch: baked or boiled potatoes; pork and beans; stewed corn, cabbage, or other vegetable; pickles; cole slaw; onions; fried pork or stew (Irish, vegetable, or beef); corn bread, light bread, and biscuits; apple pie; butter and syrup; coffee and milk.

Dinner: meat of two kinds; pork and beans; soup; potatoes; stewed vegetables; rice or pudding; fresh fruit; cake; corn bread and light bread; milk and coffee.