Cleaning your cutting boards well does seem like a good thing o do when you are in a commercial kitchen. It does also seem like a good idea to use plastic cutting boards. That way, you don't have to worry so much about cross-contamination. It does seem like a good idea to get a restaurant quality cutting board.
10 Restaurant Food Safety Tips for Your Commercial Kitchen
The CDC says nearly 1 in 6 individuals gets sick from foodborne illness because of poor food safety, 128,000 are hospitalized and 3,000 die from foodborne diseases each year. Many people, such as pregnant women or the elderly, are at risk of getting severely sick from foodborne illnesses.
Check out our top ten food safety tips for your commercial kitchen to ensure your kitchen stays safe for your employees and customers. But first, let’s differentiate between two important topics: restaurant safety, writ large, and restaurant food safety.
What is Restaurant Safety & Why Does it Matter?
Restaurant safety encompasses the topic of food safety in restaurants, but there’s also so much more to restaurant kitchen safety than what may at first meet the eye. In other words, restaurant safety encompasses food safety, but food safety does not always encompass restaurant safety in general.
So, what is restaurant safety, writ large? AMTrust Financial, which often helps educate restaurants about loss control best practices, breaks it down pretty well in its aptly titled piece “Restaurant Safety Tips and Best Practices”.
A restaurant kitchen or commercial kitchen can be a dangerous place, as anyone who’s worked in one long enough surely knows firsthand. Think about it: there’s everything from open flames that can cause kitchen fires to sharp knives which can cause cuts and injuries to raw meats that can carry disease and bacteria to foods that can be dangerous if not prepared correctly. So while food safety is certainly important, it’s hardly the only thing that goes into restaurant safety.
Here are some of the most important non-food-related restaurant safety components to consider when establishing restaurant kitchen safety rules at your establishment and training all staff on kitchen safety rules and procedures:
- Slip and Fall Protection : Eliminating or reducing wet surfaces, keeping stairways and hallways clean and clear of clutter, incorporating slip-resistant surfaces, and cleaning grease and oil correctly and promptly are all essential. So is the proper procedure for using potentially slippery cleaning agents.
- Protection Against Cuts, Strains, and Burns: You want to work as hard as possible to create conditions where injuries do not occur for you and your staff. But sometimes, injuries are unavoidable. Whether it’s a cut from broken glass, burns associated with cooking food at high temps, or strains from lifting heavy equipment or food in bulk, you want to be sure you’re able to treat any injuries that do occur and that your staff knows what to do in the event of a kitchen emergency.
- Protection Against Chemical Exposure: From exposure to harsh cleaners to exposure to harsh disinfectants, there are plenty of risks involved when using the chemicals and products associated with restaurant safety and sanitation. So be sure you and your staff know the risks and the right ways by reading and understanding the safety data sheet for each product used in your kitchen.
By incorporating the above general commercial kitchen safety and loss prevention tips into the creation of your professional kitchen rules, you can ensure that everyone stays safer so you can focus more on what matters most: cooking up culinary creations that wow your customers!
Food Safety Guidelines for Restaurants
A well-run commercial kitchen means maintaining the utmost cleanliness and safe conditions for your food preparation. If you were to accidentally contaminate an area with Salmonella or other dangerous bacteria, your customers and employees could get very sick. You also need to know how to pass any checks done by the local health department, so your restaurant can operate with full certification. This also gives you, the owner, peace of mind.
A commercial kitchen can sometimes be so hectic that it can be hard to ensure everything is done properly. However, it's your duty, and the duty of your entire staff, to make sure that everything runs smoothly. By following these 10 restaurant food safety guidelines, you'll make sure that your kitchen is meeting all applicable health and safety standards while providing the best quality service for your customers.
Promote hand washing
The most important food safety tip is hand washing. This means you provide a dedicated hand washing station for your employees. This will minimize cross-contamination and let your employees have clean hands before touching any food, whether it be meat or vegetables.
Even the smallest amount of bacteria can make someone sick if it's on a piece of food, so hand washing is key. All of your staff should wash their hands for at least 20 seconds under running water after soaping up well.
Don't let sick workers prepare food
The CDC's Environmental and Health Sciences branch conducted a survey of 486 food workers in nine states. The results showed that 5% of workers said they prepared food when they were suffering from vomiting or diarrhea. By doing so, they put their customers' health at risk. You shouldn't need food safety tips to tell you if your employees are sick, keep them away from the food.
Use Gloves
Your workers should be wearing kitchen gloves when preparing food in a commercial kitchen, but they can't use the same gloves for every ingredient. It's important that they change their gloves regularly when moving from raw meat and poultry to cooked food. If they don't change their gloves, they can spread contaminants to the customer's food, which may lead to food poisoning. Have boxes of gloves available so your workers can change them efficiently and properly.
Wash food properly
Make sure your staff washes fruits and vegetables properly. Even if a vegetable will be peeled or skinned, it must still be washed. If you don't wash food correctly in a commercial kitchen, then you risk spreading bacteria from the outside of the produce to the inside as you prepare it.
A colander will make the task easier, as long as it is only used for fruits and vegetables, and not any other ingredients, such as pasta or raw meats.
Tomatoes require special care, as 12 cases of Salmonella have been linked to tomatoes in recent years. You should never let your tomatoes soak in standing water, but instead, run them under cold water to scrub them thoroughly.
Fruits and vegetables should be washed under cold running water or with a commercial FDA-approved fruit and vegetable rinse. You can check with your local health department to see which options you may use in your kitchen.
Cook to the right temperatures
If one food safety tip is most imperative of all, thatis knowing your food items' safe temperature zones.
Is your food being cooked to the right temperature? You should make sure all of your kitchen staff are aware of the commercial kitchen rules and guidelines for safe cooking temperatures by food type. Chicken, for instance, needs to be cooked to 165°F.
The FDA advises restaurants should cook ground beef to a temperature of 155°F for 15 seconds. This is to prevent E-coli, which is found in ground beef and accounts for many cases of foodborne illness. But any type of meat being prepared and cooked in a commercial kitchen should be checked with a meat thermometer for proper temperature.
Be sure to use a separate thermometer for each different type of meat you cook, as this will prevent contamination of cooked meats by raw meats.
Avoid Cross-Contamination
Food illness often stems from cross-contamination, where you can spread bacteria from raw meat or poultry to ready-to-eat foods. You should separate cutting boards for raw produce, raw uncooked meat, raw poultry, seafood, and eggs. You may opt to label each board with its intended purpose or use a color-coded system.
Find what works best for your kitchen, but be sure to keep boards separate from one another. Don't forget to use separate utensils and meat thermometers as well.
Store food correctly and at the right temperature
All of your kitchen's raw meat and poultry should be kept separate from other foods, especially vegetables, prepared sauces, and anything else that requires little preparation.
The FDA advises food should be cooled to 41°F or below and should be cooled in a way that provides ventilation, such as in a shallow pan so air can circulate around the food. You also make sure your meat doesn't drip and contaminate other food.
Cut vegetables should never be left out at room temperature, but instead properly stored away. Never store food on the floor either and have a thermometer in the refrigerator, not just the freezer.
Clean and sanitize preparation surfaces and equipment regularly
Your commercial kitchen staff needs a proper workstation and equipment to do their job satisfactorily. Use hot soapy water or a small amount of commercial bleach or cleaner on cutting boards, dishes, countertops, and more. Ask your local health department what they require when it comes to food prep and sanitation. Don't neglect your commercial restaurant equipment either, and be sure you clean it properly as advised by the manufacturer.
Label food well by date
You need to know what ingredients you have on hand, and also when they arrived, so you make sure nothing turns bad and is unusable. Remember FIFO, or First In, First Out. Don't be afraid to throw out old food that you shouldn't use. If you're questioning whether you should serve something, it's better to throw it out than risk a customer getting sick.
Train your staff
A knowledgeable kitchen staff is a good kitchen staff. You need to offer proper training techniques to your staff, so they're aware of food safety - you may direct them to our food safety tips blog if you find it useful. If you don't train your staff, they may take shortcuts or forget things, increasing the risk of your customers getting sick. Each new kitchen staff member should be shown the proper way to do something, and should also be given guidelines on what not to do.
If in doubt about any of the tips shared in this blog post, you should check with your local health department.
Having a good idea of what's expected will go a long way towards ensuring your customers enjoy their meal, and come back.
You can also visit the CDC website for recommendations, statistics, and much more. You should also visit FoodSafety.gov to keep up with any food safety recalls, cooking tips, and other important information.
Even More Food Safety Tips & Tricks:
Know the Danger Zone and The Two-Hour Rule
The danger zone is a term used by the food safety industry to refer to the range of temperatures where bacteria will multiply rapidly, often in as little as 20 minutes. The danger zone is temperatures between 40 °F and 140 °F; here is where Salmonella and other harmful bacteria can develop in perishable food. Perishable food is any food that must be refrigerated, such as seafood, poultry, and meat.
It’s essential to know how to stay out of the danger zone, and that begins with how long you let food set out. Food removed from refrigeration should never sit for more than 2 hours, and if the temperature is above 90 °F, then the food shouldn’t be left out for more than 1 hour.
The same goes for any prepared food, such as soup, stew, and other concoctions. Foods such as these should also be checked regularly to ensure it is above 140 °F in temperature; if the food is cool, you must adjust the temperature and check again in 30 minutes
Stop Bacteria from Growing
Bacteria crave warm, moist areas, as this is where they flourish most. To keep bacteria at bay, make sure that you’re adequately heating or cooling your food within the guidelines:
- Hot food must be kept at or above 140 °F, and you can use commercial restaurant equipment such as chafing dishes, warming trays, and slow cookers to keep temperatures at the proper level.
A cold environment means that bacterial growth is slowed, but not absent from your food. Cooked food needs to be stored properly in a shallow container at 40 °F or below within the 2-hour window or else you risk bacteria growth. It’s important to remember that refrigerators, while they can keep bacteria at bay, are still areas where bacteria can grow.
Keeping an eye on your raw foods is important as most raw food can only be in the refrigerator for a few days before spoiling and becoming unsafe to eat. Food in the freezer under 32°F will have dormant bacteria, meaning bacteria exist but won’t reproduce.
As you can imagine, bacteria are killed at high temperatures, and once the food nears a temperature of 145°F, it starts to die. The USDA outlines a recommended minimum safe internal temperature for various perishable foods. Foods vary by density, size, and how much handling is required to prepare them so the minimum temperatures aren’t a one-size-fits-all recommendation.
The USDA recommends letting the meat rest for at least three minutes after removing it from heat before you carve it or eat it.
The best way to measure the temperature of the food is to use a quality thermometer that can give an accurate reading, especially when preparing meat and other dense dishes. You should get a reading by inserting the probe into the thickest section and reading the dial, making sure you aren’t touching a bone, or else you’ll have a false reading.
Want even more insight into proper food safety for your kitchen? Check out the following infographic from Kitchenbyte.com
Comments
The kitchen is one of the most eventful places in our home and it must be clean as well as some safety precautions must be followed. Your blogs clearly explain the ways of building safety ways to do the things in the safest way.All points make sense. Thank you for the information.
I appreciate what you said about making sure to keep everything properly sanitized and cleaned regularly. My aunt has been talking about opening her own restaurant and I want to make sure that she takes good care of all of her equipment. I think that I'll pass this advice along to her so that she won't have to worry about replacing her appliances and things before it becomes more necessary.
I like that you mentioned the importance of labeling your food. This is a great way of making sure that the people in the food prep area are aware of this. My cousin who was looking into confectionery suppliers would love knowing this.
I like how you suggested to label food well by date. I have been working on making my kitchen a safer place. Thanks for the food safety tips.
thank you for this article this helps me a lot
Thank you for pointing out that making sure people are washing their hands is one of the most important food safety steps. Making sure your employees have the proper training seems very important. Hopefully, anyone working with food finds the right food safety class for them.
thanks for the information
Having a restaurant or a food stall is an amazing business. But with such business, good hygiene is a must. We should always make sure that we serve our customer not only delicious food but also a safe one to eat.
i have read all blog, i like all 10 Food Safety Tips for Your Commercial Kitchen. All these tips were most i like Use Gloves and Wash food.
Wonderfully Shared post!! thanks for sharing this great content to my vision, keep sharing. This will help me choose the right things to maintain the kitchen hygiene. Thanks a lot!!
Wow the substitutions app seems extra helpful to accommodate others in this day and age. Proper cooking procedures are key!
Thank you so much for the tips! Your kitchen is the heart of your home but it can also be a case of food poisoning waiting to happen.
Food safety is must in commercial kitchen as you can maintain various food safety rules in kitchen by using gloves and covering head by polythene as it will help to keep food safe moreover you can use some other tips also just like never let sick people to prepare food as their germs can evaluate and make other person sick.
I love reading your blog. It is full of so much good information.
Very Helpful Content, Keep Writing
Good post useful info
Thanks, Sheedi!
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