What are the importance of knowing how do you use cleaning tools and chemicals for sanitizing of kitchen tools and equipments?

Maintaining a regular cleaning and sanitizing schedule is integral to preventing cross-contamination and food-borne illness. There are four main types of cleaning agents used in commercial kitchens:

1. Detergents
2. Degreasers
3. Abrasives
4. Acids

For effective cleaning, be sure to use the correct cleaning agent for the type of item to be cleaned, the cleaning method you’ll be using and the type of soiling on the item. Learn about the four most common types of cleaning agents and when to use them.

1. Detergents

Detergents are the most common type of cleaning agent and are used in home and commercial kitchens. They work by breaking up dirt or soil, making it easy to wash it away.

The detergents used in commercial kitchens are usually synthetic detergents made from petroleum products and may be in the form of powder, liquid, gel or crystals.

2. Degreasers

Degreasers are sometimes known as solvent cleaners and are used to remove grease from surfaces such as oven tops, counters and grill backsplashes.

Methylated spirits or white spirit were commonly used as degreasers in the past. Most food businesses now try to use non-toxic, non-fuming degreasers in their operations to prevent chemical contamination.

3. Abrasives

Abrasives are substances or chemicals that depend on rubbing or scrubbing action to clean dirt from hard surfaces. In commercial kitchens, abrasives are usually used to clean floors, pots and pans.

Abrasives should be used with care as they may scratch certain types of materials used for kitchen equipment such as plastic or stainless steel.

4. Acids

Acid cleaners are the most powerful type of cleaning agent and should be used with care. If they are not diluted correctly, acid cleaners can be very poisonous and corrosive.

Acid cleaners are generally used to remove mineral deposits and are useful for descaling dishwashers or removing rust from restroom facilities.

Properly handling cleaning agents

Remember that exposure to chemicals used in cleaning agents can lead to skin irritations, chemical poisoning, respiratory problems and, in extreme cases, even death. In a food business, all employees should be properly trained in understanding chemical hazards, how to handle products safely and what personal protective equipment should be worn when handling the product. Best practices for handling cleaning agents include:

• storing chemicals in a secure place in their sealed original containers, well away from food or any equipment may come into contact with food
• wearing personal protective equipment required to be worn when handling the product, such as gloves or safety glasses
• following the manufacturer’s instructions when using the product or disposing of the product
• cleaning and sanitising cleaning equipment such as brushes, mops and other janitorial tools after use and storing them in a well maintained, dry, locked area
• using different cloths for wiping and cleaning, and replacing them regularly

Always follow cleaning with sanitizing

Cleaning is only the first step to a germ-free kitchen. Cleaning is done using detergent, but it doesn’t kill bacteria or other microorganisms that can cause food poisoning. To kill bacteria and ensure a clean workplace, you must follow cleaning with sanitizing.

Effective cleaning and sanitizing also helps to:

• prevent pests from entering your business
• prevent cross-contamination
• prevent allergic reactions caused by cross-contamination

Make sure everyone who handles food in your business knows how to clean and sanitize properly and why it's important. Keep a regular kitchen equipment cleaning schedule to keep track of daily, weekly and monthly tasks. Enrolling your staff in a food handling course can help to ensure that your business stays compliant with food safety laws and regulations, passes health inspections and protects customers from health risks like allergic reactions and food poisoning.

The Canadian Institute of Food Safety (CIFS) provides online food safety courses that are approved in every province and territory in Canada. For more information about our Food Handler Certification Course, contact us or view our food handling certificate course page.

Updated by: David C. Dugdale, III, MD, Professor of Medicine, Division of General Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA. Also reviewed by David Zieve, MD, MHA, Medical Director, Brenda Conaway, Editorial Director, and the A.D.A.M. Editorial team.

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If you run a restaurant or simply have a home kitchen which supports your catering business, you understand the value of serving hygienic food to your customers. Cleaning your kitchen premises and equipment ensures that clean food preparation is carried out in order to improve kitchen efficiency and reduce environmental impacts.  Here at LJ Stuart, we cannot emphasise enough how critical it is to regularly clean your kitchen premise and equipment, as it not only influences the income from your food business, but it also ensures that you are following the criteria set out by local authorities in maintaining food hygiene standards. 

Depending on where you live, the local authorities would usually have a set of guidelines and protocols that you would have to implement in order to meet a certain required standard for food hygiene. A part of this includes how clean the working condition of a kitchen is as well as its cleaning equipment. In order to comply with this, there are usually certificates food preparation practitioners would have to have as well. Here in Australia, the health, well-being and safety of people are taken very seriously. As such, good food hygiene is a must in every food business. This ensures the health, well-being and safety of consumers. 

While it is common understanding to ensure a high standard of hygiene where food is being prepared, we often still see media reports on rat infestations at so and so catering business or restaurant, and there are television shows such as Kitchen Nightmares by Gordon Ramsay which showcase that the cleanliness standards for many food businesses being low. This can impact the reputation of these food businesses, ever more emphasizing the importance of maintaining good kitchen premise and equipment hygiene standards. So let us explore this further take a look at the main factors which contribute to the importance of cleaning kitchen premises and equipment.

Health and Safety

This is the single most important factor as to why it is important to clean your kitchen premise and equipment. Ensuring that the kitchen areas are clean promotes the following: clean food preparation, safety of kitchen staff and prevention of infestation or (cross-) contamination. By ensuring the highest standards for your kitchen area cleanliness, you are also not getting into trouble with the law, as you would be complying with local food authority kitchen cleanliness standards. 

For example, if a kitchen benchtop has not been cleaned, it can contaminate food with bacteria such as Salmonella, which can then cause food poisoning. If there was an oil spill on the kitchen floor, it can then cause kitchen staff to slip and be injured. If some food scrap rubbish was not taken out properly, it would have caused rodents such as rats to find their way into the kitchen, thereby potentially spreading diseases. 

Moreover, health and safety inspectors also do surprise inspections to understand the true cleanliness of a kitchen. If found below standards, consequences can include fines and penalties. Therefore, ensure health and safety standard are met with, it is important to take the time and effort out daily to clean your kitchen premise and equipment thoroughly. I understand that this can be a hassle, and sometimes even costly to ensure staff stay back a bit longer to clean up thoroughly, but the positives outweigh the negatives. It is also important for food business owners or kitchen managers to monitor this process and perform a check daily to ensure that standards are being met.

Maintenance and Cost

While daily cleaning might seem to consume a lot of time and effort, this prevents a build-up of dirt and grime on kitchen premise and equipment. Dirt, grime and many food stains are tough to remove already, even if they have been there for thirty minutes. Compound that into days, weeks or months, the removal of such things can be super difficult and cost a lot more!

Moreover, a build-up of dirt, grime and stains can reduce the efficiency of your kitchen output. Residue like grime can cause the hinges of kitchen equipment such as ovens or refrigerators to slow down from opening and closing repeatedly, thereby causing the kitchen workflow to become less efficient. Another example is the accumulation of dirt in cupboards which store food items or the kitchen floor. When this happens, it makes these items stink and become less easy to use, thereby causing more frequent changes of these items prematurely, which translates to a larger cost to the business. 

Reputation and Revenue

I leave the best for last, because as a food business, these two factors drives the entire business. This ties in with the health and safety, whereby customers will only go to a catering business or restaurant which serves them clean food (from a clean kitchen) and not leave them vomiting with diarrhoea. 

Ensuring a kitchen is clean and the equipment are clean also prevents the kitchen from reeking any sorts of nasty smell that may seep out into the restaurant, or that may be found on the utensils or cutlery that is being presented to or used by customers. If customers detect dirt on your catering equipment, or some sort of funky fish smell on your serving spoon, it impacts the way they view your business and leaves them questioning whether they should order from you again. 

Therefore, this impacts the reputation of the food business, which then translates to how many customers you may get, which impacts the overall revenue. With the large number of satelliting food bloggers who like to visit kitchens to understand the journey of delicious food to a larger demand of consumers nowadays wanting transparency of food preparation, it if now more important than ever to ensure that your kitchen premise and equipment are kept clean, as it is more easy to risk the reputation of your food business. Plus, with social media and its inherent ability to store data and accumulate reviews, one quick review from a consumer about a dirty kitchen can taint the reputation of a food business. 

With these reasons in mind, it is important to understand that the time and effort put into maintaining the cleanliness of your kitchen premise and equipment should be seen as an investment into your food business.