Professional kitchens follow strict safety guidelines to make sure everything runs smoothly. Discover the safety guidelines these professional kitchens follow.
The professional kitchen is quite different from the casual home kitchen. Commercial kitchens are fast-paced settings where all employees follow strict safety guidelines to keep everything in check. Whether you’re a curious home cook or a pro chef looking for a refresher, here are some of the safety guidelines professional kitchens follow.
Top-Notch Hygiene
Professional kitchens have some of the strictest hygiene guidelines to promote food safety. To promote only the cleanest and most hygienic kitchens, food staff must wash their hands regularly, wear kitchen gloves, use hairnets, and never prepare food when sick. The hygiene policies don’t stop at the staff, though. Food staff must regularly clean and sanitize all surfaces where they prepare food to prevent cross-contamination. Most kitchens are careful about food disposal and the locations of garbage cans, and they replace their trash cans regularly to cut down on bacteria.
Washing Food Properly
Professional chefs and kitchen staff have professional training on the proper procedures for washing food. Most amateur chefs will do a quick Google search to see if they need to wash an ingredient first, but the pro chefs have this information memorized. Washing certain ingredients, like vegetables, helps cut down on cross-contamination risks from bacteria, so it’s an integral step in the cooking process.
Proper Cooking Temperatures
Some home cooks may like to experiment with cooking temperatures and times, but professional kitchens have this down to a science. Most professional kitchens can’t risk overcooking or undercooking their meals, so they must have guidelines for cooking times and temperatures.
This is another area that professional chefs have mastered and memorized. On top of wasting ingredients, undercooked foods can cause illness. This is one more reason commercial kitchens must be careful and make sure they completely cook every meal—they can’t risk getting a customer sick.
These are just a few of the safety guidelines professional kitchens follow and a glimpse at how they differ from the average home kitchen. Make sure that your commercial kitchen and its staff implement these rules and guidelines as well.
