Employees eating free or reduced?

While your employees are working a shift do you give them food for free or charge them a reduced rate?

My employees are allowed one sandwich and two sodas per shift (6 hours). The iced tea and water are all-they-can-drink.

Most places Ive been allow the cooks what eve they want within reason.
I ran one place and we did a sit down lunch for all the crew. We ate as a group and passed the food like a family. We added five dollars per meal to their income(they didnt have to pay) and then wrote it off for taxes. It was nice.
As for pop. Any place that would deny a cook in a 130 degree kitchen wouldnt keep staff.
britt

I say give it to them free...I worked in a BBQ joint in high school and the owner let us eat anything on menu except the ribs. One meat choice and side
and whatever drink. All the tea and water you wanted while you worked.

jeez, give em a few dogs, how much can it possibly cost ya?

I don't exactly remember how it went, but it was a joke... A bookkeeper at a couple places I worked at told me if I gave an employee a free meal, it's like a tip, and has to be reported (like a tip). Like I want to keep track of any more crap. Came up with the theory (a working one at that), just charge them 25 cents a meal and call it good.

Oh, and it's normally all you can drink sodas also... Kitchen staff normally never see any tips (cooks, prep cooks, dishwashers, etc), so you need to look out for them... Plus if they're happy, your tipped employees (bartenders, waitress's) will be better off in the long run from the better service they receive...

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-thunder14jan14,0,3440106.story

At the catering hall, we were allowed to eat dinner after breaking down the buffets from our party/ies - the chef would take the food we brought back to the kitchen from the buffet, keep whatever he was going to reuse, and let us eat whatever we wanted from the rest. It was usually good stuff too - chicken, mashed potatoes, steamed vegetables, garden salad, fresh fruit, rolls, etc. Nothing to complain about at all, and we were only limited in that we had to pick from what he couldn't reuse.

At the college cafeteria/grill, it was different - we were allowed to eat a meal if we were working the shift for that meal. Technically you were still supposed to swipe your ID for the meal, but none of us ever did. Shifts in between meals (i.e. 1-4 pm) were not allowed meals. But most of the student shifts there were only 2-3 hours anyway. If you worked over 6 hours, you were required to take a 1/2 hour break and could eat then. The grill was much the same, people working a meal shift would get their meal free (whatever was the "exchange meal" for that day) and drinks were all-you-want. Nobody ever went hungry.