Kitchen Crew Safety and Hygiene

In practically every restaurant kitchen that I get to see, I would notice a couple of unfavorable practices. These practices, if left uncorrected, would be detrimental to the property and the people working there.

I have seen cooks not wearing closed toe shoes or even wearing short pants. In most kitchens, slippery floors and disorganized kitchen setup are common.

For a more detailed discussion, I will only talk about kitchen crew's safety and hygience in this article. More on the general kitchen safety and hygiene in coming articles.

BASIC CLOTHING
Kitchen crew from dishwashers to dispatchers to the people who actually cook should be wearing the following:

• Chef's hat/toque/hairnet
• Sleeved shirt
• Apron
• Closed toe shoes
• Long pants

A washcloth would be best together with getup. Jewelry and body piercing should be prohibited including the use of cellphones and other consumer electronic devices during hours of work.

HYGIENE
The most basic would be for kitchen staff to come to work clean and smelling clean. Basic things like a bath, toothbrush and fresh, clean, pressed clothes. I always advise cooks not to wear perfume to work as it gets in the way of tasting and smelling food clearly.

Aside from a staff's personal hygiene, the cleanliness of the kitchen should also be taken into consideration. The kitchen floor needs to be clean and dry at all times. Slippery floors are a magnet for accidents. When a cook is carrying hot food to another location and slips, it might result ot injuries and burns. And of course, food cost down the drain. Trash bins should also be covered and emptied out at least once a day to discourage pests into the kitchen.

Kitchen cabinets should be screeened and cleaned at least every other week. Freezers and refrigerators should be defrosted every week. It is also important to note that different compartments should be assigned to vegetables, fish and seafoods, poultry, beef, pork and other frozen items.

Every kitchen should have a handwash area at the entrance so that every person who comes into the kitchen sees it and is reminded to disinfect hands before doing anything in the kitchen.

KITCHEN SAFETY
Staff should have areas where they can sit and do paperworks and not near burners or on kitchen work tables. Knives should be sharpened as dull knives bring more accident and needs more effort from the user's part. When a knife is dull, more pressure is needed for it to cut through something. Knives should be stored with the blade down or away from the person.

Kitchen equipment should be assigned an area according to their purpose. More importantly, everybody should know how they are organized. It would be very inconvenient to show where a certain equipment is placed in the peak of operations.

Fire extinguishers should also be in accessible areas. All the people who work in the kitchen should be oriented properly on fire prevention and what to do during a fire. A medicine first aid kit should be put together with first aid remedies and burn ointments.