For many households, the kitchen is the most popular room. It’s a place for preparing and cooking food, enjoying a meal together and where people like to congregate. But it’s also a place that should be kept clean and germ-free.
Here’s a guide to good kitchen hygiene:
Wash your hands
Unclean hands can spread harmful bacteria around the kitchen and onto food. It’s important, then that you wash your hands thoroughly with soap and warm water before you prepare food and after touching raw foodstuffs like meat, poultry and vegetables.
Storing and cooking food
Raw meat, including poultry, can contain harmful bacteria, such as Campylobacter, that can spread to anything it touches, so keep raw food away from ready-to-eat foods such as bread, salad and fruit. It is advisable to use different chopping boards for raw and ready-to-eat foods and when storing raw meat, keep it in a sealed container on the bottom shelf of the fridge away from other foods.
Wash fruit and vegetables
You should wash fruit and vegetables under cold running water before eating them to remove germs, and possible traces of pesticides and dirt. Peeling them is also a good idea.
Don’t think that buying pre-washed fruit and vegetables means you shouldn’t still do this – health experts are advising people to still thoroughly wash pre-packaged items, especially after a number of people have died from contracting E-coli poisoning from such items.
Cleaning up
Because work surfaces and chopping boards can harbour many germs make sure they are thoroughly washed and cleaned after you have finished preparing food. Washing up sponges, clothes and tea towels can be the perfect place for bacteria to breed, so wash or replace them regularly.
Don’t forget the sink
Sinks are where the washing up takes place and where food scraps linger, so it’s important to clean them regularly to keep the bacteria at bay.
You should use a good kitchen sink cleaner on a regular basis and also ensure thorough drain maintenance. Buster offers a range of products that used on a regular basis will keep your drain free of blockages and smelling clean.
Also important, is to remember not to put any foodstuffs down that drain that might cause a blockage, such as coffee grounds, vegetable peel, and fat and grease.
