How To Prepare Your Commercial Kitchen To Pass a Sanitation Audit

May 6, 2021   

City and State food inspectors perform random, unannounced visits for the sole purpose of audits. These audits happen once per year, sometimes even more frequently. Given the fact that they are random, it is always best practice to always be ready for an inspection. The best strategy to get a passing grade is to always be ready for the inspection.  “Stay ready so you don’t have to get ready”.

Here are some of the ways you can prepare your Palm Beach Commercial kitchen for a successful inspection and avoid being featured on dirty dining or even worse, cause foodborne illness to your patrons.

Make a Kitchen Cleaning Checklist and Check It Twice

Thorough and regular cleaning of the kitchen is key to averting a failed inspection. Bacteria can proliferate if employees fail to clean ingredients, countertops, cooking utensils, and their hands frequently. If you want to maintain the high standard of cleanliness in your commercial kitchen, make a checklist detailing the sanitation tasks that must be finished by your staff during the working day and at the end of a shift. These lists usually include:

• Sweeping, mopping, and sanitizing floors
• Emptying trash bins daily and sanitize them
• Sanitize all kitchen surfaces with food-grade cleaners
• Clean kitchen equipment, such as stoves, fryers, grease traps, and grills
• Changing the rags and sanitizing water frequently

Equally important to making this list is checking the completed cleaning tasks of the employees regularly to make sure they’re doing it correctly. Without your continued follow-up and the cooperation of your staff, it’s easy to overlook vital sanitation tasks, which could affect business operations once an inspector visits your establishment.

Hire a Professional Maintenance Company to Deep Clean Your Kitchen Exhaust Systems

The purpose of the exhaust hoods in a commercial kitchen is to gather airborne grease, which affects the quality of the food prepared in the kitchen and is also a fire hazard. Grease can trickle from the hood system onto the prepared dish, which may contaminate the food. Additionally, employees can no longer use cooking utensils and equipment with grease drippings on them.

Cleaning the exhaust hood system thoroughly is crucial to meeting sanitation inspection standards. You can achieve this goal by enlisting a professional that can properly execute the kitchen hood cleaning process and guarantee that your cooking area is both up to code and safe from fire.

Perform Regular Self-Inspections

Conducting unexpected self-inspections can also keep your commercial kitchen in line with the sanitation standards of your local health department. It’s a good idea to perform these inspections at different times. This way, workers will put more effort into adhering to the essential kitchen safety and health practices.

Administering surprise audits also alerts you on any reoccurring or common violations that occur in your kitchen, such as:

• Food left unrefrigerated for too long
• Ready-to-eat foods coming into contact with raw meat
• Dirty utensils and cooking surfaces

When performing these self-inspections, check for common sanitation violations more frequently until the staff has solved the problem. On top of that, reward workers who can correct these violations quickly.

Hire the Right Cleaning Company for Your Commercial Kitchen

Keep your commercial kitchen in immaculate condition by teaming with the cleaning pros at InterKleen. We are ready to add your commercial kitchen to our list of satisfied clients. When you’re ready to work with the best commercial cleaning company in Palm Beach county give us a call at (561) 732-1818 or visit our contact page.