FESmag

Amelia Levin

When It Comes to Restaurants: Cleanliness Is Godliness
October 9, 2008

Today on the front page of the Chicago Tribune there was an article written by one of the dining writers on staff who followed around two health inspectors to a couple of restaurants on the city’s Northwest side. They encountered some hairy, hairy things, such as: temperatures of ready-to-go and stored foods that were way off the 40 to 140 range, rodent droppings and even a live mouse. This was shocking to say the least. And I definitely lost my appetite for my mid-morning snack, at least for a few minutes. More on that later.

But then I re-examined the issue from the perspective of the restaurant owner. While filth and rodents are completely unacceptable, on the flipside, from an operation’s standpoint, it takes an enormous amount of work to keep a restaurant kitchen clean. Even when you think it’s sparkling, there’s still grime to be had. And when you’re trying to pump out dish upon dish, among other tasks, staff members can lose sight of their sanitation duties. I’m ServSafe-certified, anal-retentive, and even I lose sight of some of these duties during my culinary school classes at Kendall College.

For example, at school, we have a three-compartment sink with a trusty spray nozzle that is my best friend, especially in baking class where sticky pots are the norm. Sometimes, though, I really wish we had a dishwasher. With an average class size of 25 students, but this bakery class is bigger than normal for Kendall, after an hour of pot washing, that water in the sink can get really gross. I mean, gross. I find myself often having to drain and refill it quite often, and most people are not as obsessive as me, if you catch my drift.

Plus, we are washing pots when class ends at 11:30 at night. Most of us have been at work all day before class, and we just want to go home, which makes it tempting to not want to take five or more minutes to change the water right then. So many of us, including myself, will give those pots a quick dip and scrub in water that’s lost its soapiness and could really use a change, and then hold it in the sanitizing sink for a few extra seconds, thinking that’ll make up for it. 

Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t, but wanting to go home at that hour at night is no different from the real restaurant worker and cook who sometimes don’t get out of there until 1 a.m. or later. 

And, as much as I love food and cooking, smells in the commercial kitchen are impossible to describe. Food smells mixing with spices, garlic, chemicals, detergents, dirt, oil, grease, people. When I first started, I came home every night, wanting to puke and taking a shower to wash the kitchen/chemical/fish filleting stink off of me. 

Now, even though I still shower after those fish filleting days, I’ve become almost completely de-sensitized, I’ll admit. This isn’t to say I’ve relinquished my anal-retentive attitude toward frequent handwashing. In fact, I’ve been washing my hands more. But when I encounter a little dirt, a little grease, some gross smells, composting bins full of scraps, I mean, it just doesn’t bother you that much anymore. It only took a month for me to get to that point where I could eat in the kitchen in which I am working.  So. I sort of understand restaurant workers who “forget” about sanitation issues because honestly, you get so immersed in things.

This is similar to when I was a reporter for the Tribune. I covered crime, basically hanging out at police stations and going to crime scenes. At first, I couldn’t sleep for two weeks. I had nightmares. I couldn’t eat turkey for about a month (flesh). Yeah, it was bad. But then, you get over it. Just like the cops did years ago. 

From another perspective, think about your own kitchen. Now I’m a little anal here when it comes to keeping my countertops bleached and clean, but have you ever gotten down on all fours and inspected each and every crevice? Probably not. And I’m not exactly tall enough to scrub down the top of my refrigerator every day either. You do your best, make sure it’s remotely clean and move on to the next task.

Fact of the matter is, whether you choose to accept it, we all live in and consume a little dirt and grime here and there. Pots that could be cleaner will ultimately heat up and cook off, and stainless steel throughout the kitchen helps, along with bleach and chlorine. In my view, and I’m no health inspector I’ll have you know, but I think it’s acceptable to have missed a few spots here and there on a daily basis, going through a deep cleaning at least once a month. 

But, and here’s the big but. This isn’t an excuse to ignore the very critical, critical  ontrol points in terms of food safety. Constantly monitor time and temperature. Wash your hands all the time, especially if you walk away from your workstation to do something else and then come back to it. Before I return I always wash my hands. And, I may skimp a little on our sanitation reports, but never on the closing temperatures of the walk-in and freezer coolers when we leave at night. And we check all of our food that goes out to the school cafeteria. 

Beyond that, fill in cracks and holes in the walls, to prevent rodent infestation. Clean the kitchen and floors daily—that’s another must. And make sure your walk-in cooler is properly organized — first in, first out, raw meats on the bottom shelves so they don’t drip on other product. Also, make sure raw vegetables stay away from raw meat in coolers and other storage areas. 

These are steps all foodservice staff members must ingrain in their heads as important. It’s one thing to pass a ServSafe exam, it’s another thing to believe in its teachings, and execute them on a daily basis. And only good leaders can encourage that, regardless if you’ve become one of the de-sensitized many. 

Posted by Amelia Levin on October 9, 2008 | Comments (0)