Article

Why Restaurant Sanitation is No Place to Scrimp

It's tempting in a tough economy or just a slow period at any restaurant to save a little money by cutting corners on a few items on that daily cleaning list. It's understandable the desire to get the staff off the clock and out the door 15 or 20 minutes sooner, thus saving a few very precious dollars each day.

But don't do it. Don't sacrifice cleanliness and jeopardize the reputation of your restaurant by taking the shortcuts or easy ways out. Your reputation is all you have, and don't ever doubt that in the eyes of your customers, cleanliness is indeed next to godliness.

Julie Nelson, a restaurant inspector in Greene County, Missouri, which includes the city of Springfield, population 156,000, sees it happen all the time - restaurant owners and managers who gamble the reputation and safety of their business all in an attempt to save a few bucks.

"A very common violation is grease buildup in the hood, and not only is that a health issue, it's a fire safety issue," says Nelson, one of eight inspectors covering about 1,200 restaurants in the county.

Grease buildup is the cause of more than 50 percent of restaurant fires, according to the National Fire Protection Association, but grease also contributes to odor problems in a restaurant, and odors attract rodents. Cockroaches are particularly attracted to grease buildup. You want your customers to be attracted to the smell of the food, not the smell of grease.

The volume of fried foods served at your restaurant determines how often the hood and exhaust system should be cleaned, but at a minimum the hood should be cleaned weekly and the exhaust system quarterly.

Another common mistake Nelson finds is improper sanitation at the dish machine. The sanitation bucket should be checked every other day. It's easily done by simply looking at the fill line on the bucket. To check that everything is working properly, test strips, available from your supplier, should be run through with a load of dishes.

This mistake is considered a critical violation. Although Nelson doesn't shut down a restaurant because of this alone, if the problem is not corrected in a specified period, the restaurant can be fined.

Reducing Labor Should Not Mean Reducing Cleanliness

A rather new problem Nelson sees with more frequency and one she attributes to the tight economy is wait staff who pick up dirty dishes, take them to the kitchen and then turn right around and pick up a plate of clean food without washing their hands.

...Come out of the office when the pest control professional is in the store. Ask him what he sees as potential problems. Ask him to visit the warehouse of your vendors. Ask if other restaurants in the area are having similar problems and how they have solved it... --Dr. Ron Harrison, technical services director for Orkin

"Where I have noticed this most often is in restaurants that have cut back on the use of bus staff to clean off tables," she says. "Wait staff that was trained just to serve food is now doing double duty by cleaning tables as well, and the necessity to wash hands in between has been overlooked." Requiring employees to wash hands again and again and again is the best advice Nelson can offer a new restaurant operator. (See "Hand Sanitation Checklist" below.)

However, her personal bugaboo, one that will result in her never eating at a restaurant again, is lack of cleanliness in the bar nozzles for soft drinks. These must be cleaned every night; otherwise fruit flies begin to breed there.

"You can't imagine how disgusting it is to find fruit fly larvae in a bar nozzle," Nelson says. Getting a fruit fly infestation in your restaurant is a hard thing to get rid of, and unlike the larvae growing in the nozzles, one that your customers can see, complain about and tell their friends and neighbors about. There goes your reputation and your business.

"The reproduction potential of insects is so high, if you don't take every step possible to avoid it or get on it immediately when discovered, it's an absolute nightmare," says Dr. Ron Harrison, technical services director for Orkin.

Harrison offers several tips that he has seen solve numerous problems for restaurant owners and managers over the years. First, he says, come out of the office when the pest control professional is in the store. Ask him what he sees as potential problems. Ask him to visit the warehouse of your vendors. Ask if other restaurants in the area are having similar problems and how they have solved it.

Then, talk with your employees. Don't overlook their lockers or their backpacks, coats, purses or items they bring to work as potential sources of trouble. "Very typically, the culture of cleanliness and concern about insects is established by the top," Harrison says. "Engage your employees in this team effort. Don't burden them with it."

He has known successful managers to offer bonuses of some sort to employees who find a cockroach or discover a potential source of infestation. It doesn't have to be big - maybe a $10 cash bonus, a free meal or drink coupons. And make sure new employees are integrated into this culture as well.

Orkin is one of several pest control companies that offer in-house training, as do many city or county health departments. Greene County's Nelson regularly offers her services to restaurants that seem to be struggling with some issues.

Other advice from Harrison:

• Take supplies out of cardboard boxes as soon as possible and take empty cardboard boxes outside, far away from the back door. Cardboard is a common carrier of cockroaches.
• Don't leave mops in buckets of water. Make sure mop heads dry by standing them with heads up.
• Don't store potatoes and onions together. This creates a breeding ground for black-eyed fruit flies.
• Put enzymes in sink and floor drains regularly to minimize buildup of gook, which attracts insects and creates odors.
• Have a deep-cleaning program every six months. Power-wash.

Harrison has additional tips for those building a restaurant from the ground up or planning for a remodel:

• Don't place a light immediately over any door, particularly the back door. Place lights and their propensity to attract bugs as far away as possible, but direct the beam of light at the door.
• Look at your landscaping. Talk with the landscape designer or nursery professional about vegetation and mulch that attracts and repels pests. Too much moisture at the foundation is a breeding ground for all sorts of critters.
• Create a positive airflow with the use of air curtains and plastic strips, particularly at the back door. And monitor employees to ensure they are not unnecessarily propping open the door for a breath of fresh air or some other purpose. Let them know why this is a problem.

Good Communication Can Avoid Bad Publicity

Communicating with employees about cleanliness is the key to some of the most successful restaurants in Johnson County, Indiana, according to the county's environmental health director, John Bonsett.

"We have food safety guidelines printed in Spanish and Chinese, and it's the restaurant owners that I have most confidence in who contact our office for those guidelines," Bonsett says. "You know they are concerned about fully communicating the rationale for these rules, rather than just telling their employees they have to do it."

Bonsett's office has also coordinated a Food Safety Day program for more than 10 years in which additional training and certification is available at no charge. Again, the restaurants where Bonsett and his staff say they are most comfortable eating are often the ones that take that extra step to educate their employees.

"It's good publicity for any restaurant when they see me or my staff eating their meals with our friends and family," he says, laughing. Bonsett recognizes the power of publicity, both good and bad, and uses it to the advantage of the restaurant patrons he serves. The health department website reports ratings from the most recent inspection of all 400 restaurants in Johnson County.

"We like to post the report because it's just a little extra motivation for operators to get it right," says Bonsett, who tells the story of one restaurant owner who was late in updating his license and had an overdue fine of $50.

"I was preparing for an afternoon board meeting and decided to give the guy a call," Bonsett says. "I told him that his violation would be included in my report to the board meeting and we were expecting members of the media at the meeting." The fine was paid within the hour and that restaurant has since had a stellar record of food safety, Bonsett says.

Not all counties make health inspection records so easily available, although they are public record. Anyone can call and ask questions, and in Washington County, Texas, code enforcement officer David Doelitsch gets a couple of calls from the curious and concerned members of the public each month.

"We're in the process of writing a new ordinance with stricter language and stricter financial penalties and when that's complete, we plan to send monthly reports to the local newspapers," Doelitsch says. "We don't intend to do that to be punitive, but we believe it will generate greater adherence to the code than a small fine."

The most common violation he finds in this rural area between Houston and Austin is slime in the ice machine, Doelitsch says. "It's an easy fix because it takes just five minutes about once a week to wipe things down with sanitized cloth, but it's one of those areas where employees seem to cut corners and managers fail to check."

Another frequent problem that Doelitsch sees is employees who handle money and then immediately handle food without washing their hands. Or, just as bad, employees who wear gloves to handle food, but do not remove those gloves to handle money or other contaminates.

Those two issues are why Doelitsch, like many health inspectors, invite operators to accompany them on the inspection and engage employees in the process as well. "It's a nice opportunity for dialogue and better understanding between two parties about what works and why," he says.

The Power of Checklists

Doelitsch and all health inspectors use a simple checklist and rating system. There's nothing secretive about it and a good operator benefits from knowing as much as possible about what the inspector seeks. Obtaining a copy of these checklists can help you develop a methodical system in your operation. Chris Tripoli with A'La Carte Foodservice Consulting Group recommends creating a universal checklist for the entire restaurant, and then breaking it down into a number of smaller checklists specific to each department and each shift for employee use.

"These should not be hanging on a clipboard in the back office, but posted right in the workspace for employees to see easily and frequently," Tripoli says. "A list should not include more than 10 items and be very specific to each station."

A universal front-of-the-house and back-of-the-house checklist is too broad for anyone other than management to work from. There should also be a "before closing" and "before opening" checklist along with daily, weekly, monthly and lists for the occasional "other." That includes things like wiping the dust that accumulates in the air vents or on top of the ceiling fans. It just needs to be done now and then.

"A checklist is really meant to be a reminder and should be included in employee manuals," Tripoli says. "Most items are common sense but a checklist helps us when our day turns crazy on us."

That said, health inspectors and guests are not worried about how crazy your day is, and they don't care about common sense. They just want to be assured they are dining in a restaurant as clean as humanly and legally possible.

There are plenty of places to cut costs, however, the cleanliness of your operation should not be one of them. Consider that the economy will improve eventually, however, it may be difficult or impossible for your business to recover from a string of bad guest experiences and publicity related to health and sanitation violations.

Food Preparation Surfaces

Sanitizing food equipment and preparation surfaces should be the last step in cleaning the kitchen. Kitchen cleaning is a multistep process, and this is the most critical cleaning in the foodservice area. It is normally accomplished in several passes. Always start with the highest surface you will be cleaning. This way if soil, dust or crumbs are knocked loose and fall to the next lower surface, they will be removed as you clean the lower surface. If you are cleaning above items that you won't be cleaning, they should be covered with plastic to protect and prevent them from becoming soiled during the cleaning of nearby or overhead surfaces.

• Using a clean white towel moistened with an approved detergent and hot water, wipe food particles and soil to the floor or onto a rag, into a box or trash bag. Use a putty knife and/or a white scrubbing pad to loosen adhered material as you proceed over the surface and around the area in a circle. Be careful not to scratch or mark surfaces. If the surface is heavily soiled, apply solution liberally and allow it to soak for five to 10 minutes before scrubbing. Several wash/scrub/rinse cycles may be needed on heavily soiled surfaces. Do not allow surfaces to dry before the second pass.
• Rinse/wipe clean all surfaces with hot water using a clean white towel. Inspect all surfaces as you proceed to see that no soil, food residue or grease remains. You cannot sanitize a surface that is dirty or contaminated with soil, food or other foreign matter, since many of these contaminants will deactivate sanitizers.
• Wipe/sanitize all food contact surfaces with a clean white towel liberally wet with an approved sanitizing solution. Do not rinse; allow to air-dry.

Food prep surfaces and equipment that are used with potentially hazardous foods such as raw poultry, seafood and meats must be cleaned throughout the day at least every four hours and more frequently under specific conditions. This is usually a cooking staff responsibility.

Front-of-the-House Inspection

When Should You Wash Your Hands?

• After using the restroom
• Before handling any food
• After touching any part of your body, including your hair
• After coughing or sneezing
• After eating or drinking
• Between handling raw- and ready-to-eat food
• After handling dirty utensils

Hand Sanitation

• Turn the faucet on for hot water.
• Remove a towel from a paper dispenser.
• Place in your hand a dribble of soap the size of a quarter.
• Wash hands for about 20 seconds.
• Rinse with hot water.
• Dry with a paper towel.
• Use towel to turn off the faucet.
• Throw away the paper towel.

Source: Steritech Inc.

Front-of-the-House Inspection

Hidden dust and dirt are everywhere in your dining room. Here are some places you may have missed in your housekeeping. Check these to make sure your dining area is in tiptop shape.

• Look up. Check where the wall meets the ceiling for cobwebs, "dusties" or whatever name you have for them. You can rid yourself of them with a towel wrapped around a broom, a special duster with an extension pole or even by just standing on a ladder with the feather duster.
• Green, growing things. Plants can enhance your restaurant, but they need upkeep. Inconsiderate guests may have left everything from a cocktail straw to a used tissue under the foliage. Pruning regularly of dead and dying leaves will keep your plants looking healthy.
• Wall art. Even art can get dirty. Make sure the tops of frames are cleaned regularly. Also check the glass on framed pieces from different angles. Finger marks and streaks from previous cleanings may appear.
• Air ducts. When you get up close and personal with the air duct, you can see a whole lot of dust and dirt. Take the vacuum hose up there from time to time to clear out the debris that's accumulated.
• Tabletop items. Don't neglect the items that stay on the tables, such as salt and pepper shakers and sugar holders. Says one cleaning consultant: "My pet peeve is salt and pepper shakers that don't get cleaned. Everyone touches them. Children put them in their mouths." Think about it.
• Light bulbs. A burned-out light bulb isn't a cleanliness issue, but it suggests neglect. What's more, it just plain looks bad so make sure all light bulbs work. Have a supply of all the different light bulbs you use in your restaurant on hand for quick replacement.
• Baseboards. When vacuuming is done quickly, it's easy to overlook the place where the floor meets the wall. This is an important area to check out, especially if just daily spot vacuuming is done. Debris tends to get pushed against the wall. Carefully run the vacuum along the baseboards, at least weekly.