Keeping your entire commercial kitchen clean can be one of the biggest challenges that one could have ever faced. Having a number of heavy-duty activities all the time happening in your kitchen, commercial kitchen cleaning can look overwhelming if you do not have a proper system in a place readily available.
In order to maintain a hygienic commercial kitchen, you will have to develop a commercial kitchen cleaning checklist that will easily outline how you can keep your restaurant kitchen neat and clean. Some jobs are meant to be done a lot of times in a single day, meanwhile many others need only be done on a weekly or a monthly basis. Frequent cleaning of your regular kitchen is very important for the safety of your food items and can help in reducing food waste that also helps in lowering whole menu costs.
Commercial Kitchen cleaning checklist
So, the commercial kitchen’s cleaning checklist includes the following.
Items That Must Be Cleaned After Each Cooking Shift
These steps are ordinary for cooks and other kitchen staff. Over and over again, they will have already subconsciously planned them into their schedule and will be able to get them done in a proper time.
- You must scrub the grills after you are done cooking red meat, poultry or any fish
- You should wipe down the line and preparation shelves
- You must always switch the cutting boards
- Keep in mind change sanitizing water as well as cleaning rags
- Always empty every empty trash bin
After Each Shift
Every individual that is working for any of the shifts either that is breakfast, lunch or dinner should always share the total responsibility to keep the kitchen clean and tidy. Following a proper time, every day for these items to be dealt with makes sure there is no disruption in cleanliness.
- Clean every fryer after use
- Brush the grills properly
- Always try to empty sanitizing buckets
- Try to send every cleaning rag in laundry
- send all aprons and chefs coats in the laundry but never with the cleaning rags
- Wash and sanitize all surfaces including every cutting board and shelves
- Always empty steam table and clean it properly
- Try to wash meat and cheese slicer after every use
- Try to cover every bin with plastic wrap
- Wash floor mats regularly
- Sweep and wipe the kitchen floor properly
- Sweep walk-in refrigerators as well
Daily Tasks
In order to save your money and time, a lot of restaurants tend to hire a professional cleaner who usually comes at night, and he makes sure that the kitchen is up to cleaning standards for the next day of use. For the daily cleaning checklist, yo0u should add the following
- Daily clean out grease traps
- Try to change foil linings of grill, range, and flattops
- Wash the can opener daily and frequently
- Run hood filters through the dishwasher
Weekly
Each of the following duties should be swapped throughout the week so that every shift gets a fair amount of work to be done. On weekly basis, you should
- Empty the coolers, wash them as well as sanitize them properly
- Drain sinks and faucets
- Clean coffee machines properly
- Wipe the ovens but always make sure to follow the manufacturer’s instruction on this specific job.
- Oil cast iron cookware
- Use drains cleaners on floor drains
Monthly
So, with the weekly cleaning list, these monthly jobs should be scheduled throughout the month, on different shifts, so that staff shares the burden of side work.
- You should wash behind the ovens, stoves, and fryers in order to cut down on grease build up, which can be a major fire hazard
- Clean every freezer in a proper manner
- Empty and sanitize the ice machines in a proper way
- Adjust the ovens
- Regulate thermometers as well
- Clean the walls and ceilings
- Wipe down the dry storage area
- Alter any pest traps
- Restock your first aid kit
- Update your material safety data sheets, which outline how to safely use any chemicals in your restaurant.
Annually
There are also a lot of important things that you must do each year in order to make sure your kitchen is clean and secure. Most of them require the help of a professional person. It will always be a good idea if you could schedule these procedures during slow seasons, or right before your busy season starts up. In this way there are a lot of issues or repairs that are required, you will lose too much business if any.
- Always check fire control system.
- Check the fire extinguishers, you can do this twice a year, depending on the place where you live in.
- Try to clean the hoods two times in a year.
- You can always consult a professional company that is specialized in hood cleaning instead of doing this job yourself as it can be a lot messy as well as time-consuming.
- Wash the pilot lights on any of your gas kitchen equipment but make sure to follow the manufacturer’s instruction properly.
Implementing all of these schedules will help a lot for your kitchen to be safe for everyone including employees and customers. It will also thwart possible food infection and help reduce food spoilage and waste, keeping profits high and staff happy.
Commercial Kitchen cleaning service
Appliances and equipment
Stoves and ovens:
All sorts of spills should be wiped after every shift to avoid any build-up of grease and grime, and the oven should be cleaned from the inside with the help of a specialist oven cleaning solutions every once a week. Apart from them, all commercial catering ovens should also be cleaned deeply by any professional service at least once every six months.
Coffee machines:
All the coffee machines present in your commercial kitchens should be cleaned after being flushed with hot water and also by using a specialist cleaning fluid that is meant to clean these machines every once a week.
Kettles
All of the kettles that are there in your commercial kitchens, as well as water boilers, should be cleaned and scraped at least once a time in a month, or even once a week if required in case your restaurant serves a lot of hot drinks in a day.
Microwaves
The microwave should be cleaned from the inside as well as outside at least one time a week, also any spills should be cleaned right after they occur during the shifts. All you have to di=o is to microwave a bowl of water for about one minute as it can help to loosen any dried-on dirt or any sort of grimes before you wipe down the interior by dipping a cloth in some antibacterial cleanser.
Refrigeration
The inside of your fridges should always be wiped as well as sanitized between every shift and given a deep clean at least once a week. Fridge hygiene is very important and it can also have a big effect on the quality and wellbeing of your food, so there is quite a lot that you must remember, you should take a look at the complete guide to fridge hygiene and safe storage to learn everything you need to know in order to properly clean the fridge.
Floors:
The most important key of keeping your commercial kitchen properly cleaned is to keep the floor cleaned always. Any major spillages should be cleaned up as soon as possible during each shift, they do not only present a hygiene hazard but also, can put your staff at risk of slips and falls as well. The floor of the commercial kitchens should also be swept or hoovered and then mopped and cleaned with the help of a disinfectant antibacterial floor cleaner after every shift.
Countertops and work surfaces:
Work surfaces that are used to prepare food should be wiped clean between every task performed, and then they must be thoroughly cleaned and disinfected after the shift has been over.
Cleaning the air quality of commercial kitchen
As we are all well aware of the fact that a clogged ventilation system or cooking hood can have an immense effect on the rest of your kitchen, as it can not filter out vapor and condensation very efficiently, which can lead to unhygienic build-ups of grease and grime on other surfaces as well. So, it is always recommended for the restaurants to not use a deep fat fryer every day and also to clean their vents and hoods a minimum of once after every 90 days. For fast-food restaurants or those that frequently use a deep fat fryer, deep cleaning should be done once every 30 days.
Conclusion
No doubt that you can clean your entire commercial kitchen by yourself, but it would always be the best option to hire commercial kitchen hood cleaners and experts to avoid any kind of fire hazards, etc. When we talk about the safety of your eating business, you should always hire the most reliable kitchen hood cleaning company as it makes a considerable difference. Even it is stated in the instructions by NFPA 96 that the whole exhaust system needs to be meticulously cleaned by a certified, trained, and qualified team of professionals in order to meet industry standards. Cleaning companies that lack the expertise, specialized tools, and adequate experience can do more harm than good. So, the best practice would be to achieve the bottom line of making sure to clean and safe kitchen exhaust systems, it is a must to hire an experienced contractor who can also ensure complete documentation.
