Cleaning Kitchen Service – 9 Kitchen Hygiene Essentials

Nine At-a-Glance Rules for Commercial Kitchen Hygiene

Complying with health and safety rules is vital in any kitchen, particularly in commercial kitchens where it is important to eliminate risk of the sickness and injury to protect your establishment’s reputation.

Here Ingot Services, who offer deep kitchen cleaning services, has compiled a list of nine commercial kitchen hygiene essentials that should never be ignored. These include the day-to-day requirements – such as keeping surfaces clean – and activities that are less frequent but none-the-less still necessary, such as organising professional duct work cleaning.

We have only just covered the basics as there are a host of ways to keep your commercial kitchen healthy. For more information on up-to-date commercial kitchen hygiene, view the Health and Safety website.

Personal Hygiene

Keeping yourself clean, wearing clean clothing, and washing your hands often is one of the top tips to prevent the transfer of bacteria and viruses onto food, crockery or kitchen surfaces. Bacteria can spread quickly, so to comply with health and safety rules it is vital to wash your hands at every stage of the food preparation process, including before and after preparing food, touching raw food, handling waste or chemicals, eating or touching your face, and after every work break.

Illnesses

If you have illnesses such as cold or flu, a skin related disease, infected wound, diarrhoea or stomach problems, you should tell your supervisor in advance of attending work. If you don’t inform your supervisor, you are breaking the law. Staff who handle food and are ill are advised to stay off work until they are symptom free for at least two full days.

Kitchen Surfaces

The best way to keep on top of cleanliness is to clean equipment and food surfaces as you go along. For a more thorough clean, Ingot Services offers a deep kitchen cleaning service, where all equipment is dismantled and cleaned and all areas of the kitchen – including hard to reach places – are thoroughly cleansed.

Reheating Food

If you are reheating food, it is important to heat it to the right temperature and ensure that it is piping hot before serving. Red meat should have a temperature of 70C in the middle and white meat, 80C. You shouldn’t reheat food more than once, and any leftovers should be thrown away.

Raw Food

It is vital for health reasons to keep the preparation of fresh and raw food entirely separate to prevent any contamination. Use colour coded chopping boards to prevent any mix-ups when food is being prepared.

Refrigeration

It goes without saying that food shouldn’t be left out and should be covered and refrigerated overnight. Keep a record of storage and expiry dates so you know exactly when food should be thrown away.

Duct Cleaning

Regular duct work cleaning should be organised to prevent the build-up of grease and grime, which can pose a fire risk. This is a legal requirement for commercial kitchens and can prove life-saving.

Cuts

Handling sharp knives can lead to minor injuries. If you do get a small cut or wound during food preparation, you are obliged to cover it with a waterproof dressing. Highly visible blue plasters are available for this purpose.

Safety

It is vital to follow procedures when making food and to work safely so you don’t put yourself or anyone else at risk. Equipment – such as sharp knives – should be stored safely and deliveries shouldn’t be left in corridors where they could be a tripping hazard. If you feel something is wrong, flag it up with your supervisor.

To find out about more duct work and deep kitchen cleaning, contact Ingot Services

Commercial Kitchen Cleaners – Restaurants Fined for Poor Hygiene

Restaurants Fined Thousands for Poor Hygiene – Commercial Kitchen Cleaners Would Have Been Cheaper

Arranging regular, scheduled cleaning by commercial kitchen cleaners can be a sound investment in your food business, in more ways than one – as some restaurants have recently discovered to their cost.

Courts are taking hygiene in restaurants seriously and are not afraid to impose significant fines on offenders. Here are just a few examples from the first half of 2014:

• A French "fine-dining" restaurant in Hove was fined a whopping £10,000 in May this year after inspectors found a number of serious hygiene problems, including a fruit fly infestation, a dangerous build up of grease in duct work, and food waste left on floors.

• In April, an Indian restaurant in Gillingham was fined £800, plus £2000 in costs, after cockroaches were discovered in a kitchen described as "filthy".

• Meanwhile, a Brighton restaurant was fined nearly £9000 in January, after inspectors found extensive evidence of mouse droppings within the kitchen. In addition the restaurant was forced to close down while the premises were cleaned and treated.

In the case of the Hove restaurant, inspectors gave the restaurant notice of the problems which needed to be addressed and only proceeded to prosecute when it was clear on a further inspection, a few weeks later, that many of the hygiene issues had still not been dealt with. A single call to commercial cleaning contractor could have resolved the entire issue for them in a weekend – and saved them several thousand pounds.

The Real Cost of Prosecution

The fines that are possible following a successful prosecution for poor hygiene can be high enough to make a severe impact on the cashflow of a business. Not many small businesses can easily find £10,000, for instance, and in some cases this type of fine could even threaten the viability of your business.

But financial cost aside, a more serious – and long-lasting – problem is probably the negative publicity surrounding a hygiene prosecution. All such cases are a matter of public record and a court case inevitably means press attention.

Local papers are always on the lookout for items relating to the local area and won't hesitate to publish the details of the case and a picture of the premises in question. And it's not hard to predict the likely effect on customers of this type of publicity.

Even if the hygiene problem itself is sorted out quickly and thoroughly, a bad reputation can take years to recover from. In many cases the only solution may be to sell up or to completely rename and relaunch the business – with obvious costs involved.

Commercial Kitchen Cleaners – Business Insurance for Restaurants

Using professional kitchen cleaners on a regular basis effectively acts as a form of business insurance for restaurants, takeaways and other food outlets:

Regular, scheduled, professional cleans can help to prevent prosecutions, fines and negative publicity by preventing hygiene problems building up to serious levels. Kitchen deep cleaning also makes it far easier for kitchen staff to maintain good daily hygiene practices afterwards.

Even when staff are vigilant about cleaning in the areas they can reasonably access (worktops, floors etc), they can't get everywhere. It is often the invisible places (under and behind appliances) where dirt can build up to a point that it can attract pests, leading to infestations.

In addition, being able to demonstrate that your premises are cleaned regularly by professionals (in addition to a good daily cleaning regime, of course) is invaluable in the event of a hygiene inspection.

Protect your business and make a professional kitchen cleaning service part of your hygiene solution by calling Ingot Services today or visiting our site at www.ingotservices.co.uk.