Running a restaurant can be a seriously rewarding business. You provide a home for people to come to, leave their worries, and fill up on some seriously yummy food. And if you hit it big, there’s some real money that can be made in the business as well.
But there’s also a lot of food laws and regulations you need to be aware of as a restauranter. Failure to comply with these laws could have you facing serious fines or totally shut down. You need to take these kinds of things very seriously.
This is a matter of public safety, so the government and officials will not be willing to cut you any slack if you aren’t up to standards. Read on, and we’ll walk you through some key tips to help you go above and beyond any examination.
1. Emphasize Cleanliness
When it comes to running an up-to-code restaurant, there’s nothing more vital than cleanliness. Cleanliness helps to avoid germs and prevents cross-contamination between different types of foods.
Cleanliness means ensuring you and your employees always take the time to wash your hands thoroughly between actions. You should wash after using the bathroom, obviously.
But you should also wash your hands after handling any kind of raw meat, touching dirty dishes, sneezing or coughing, or taking any sort of break outside or away from the kitchen. All of these instances can bring in germs that can easily contaminate the food that you’re preparing for customers.
By the same token, you should keep a clean storefront and avoid germs this way as well. Clear tables and don’t allow food to sit out for a long period of time. Keep counters both in the kitchen and out front clean and sanitized between uses.
2. Keep Food Separated
The way you store your food is just as important as the way you cook it. It can be a huge move against regulations to keep raw food and cooked food next to one another. This is because it can be a huge public safety hazard, as bacteria can quickly travel from the raw food to the cooked.
It’s best to keep separate areas for raw and cooked food where they are far apart. It’s also a good idea to keep raw food on lower shelving in storage areas. This can help prevent them from dripping down onto other foods.
The same methodology should be applied to the materials you use to cut and handle food. Never use the same knives and cutting boards to handle raw food as you do cooked. At least not without a very good cleaning session in between.
It can be hard to keep up with all of these different rules, which is why some employ software to help keep on top of things. You can find out more about this technology and see if it’s right for you.
3. Demonstrate Progress
If you’ve had a bad inspection in the past, the most important thing you can do is show an inspector that you’re attempting to rectify the situation. If an inspector returns and nothing has changed, there’s little hope that they’ll be willing to cut you a break when it comes to your restaurant.
However, if you can show your eagerness and willingness to comply, you might get a little more leeway with an inspector. There are many ways you can show this willingness.
The obvious would be to take corrective actions as soon as possible. If something in your restaurant was not up to code, get rid of it and replace it as soon as you can. If an inspector is planning to come back before you’d be ready with changes, consider presenting an action plan to them.
An action plan outlines concrete steps that you’re planning to take to improve the quality of your restaurant. It should be highly detailed and include dates by which you hope to achieve each step and explanations why you need the time to implement these changes.
If you can show an inspector you’re seriously trying to get up to code, you should have a better chance at succeeding in your inspection.
4. Employee Behavior
Ensuring that your employees are complying with code is one of the most important steps that you can take. An inspector seeing an employee acting out of code can sink your restaurant’s chances of passing inspection.
You need to make sure employees are wearing hairnets and keeping hair out of their faces. Beards, mustaches, and facial hair of all sorts must be covered as well. Those handling food should also keep their fingernails short to avoid food and contamination from getting underneath.
Those handling food in the kitchen also need to leave jewelry at home. handling food while wearing bracelets, rings, earrings, or anything such as these is prohibited by regulations. Much like in previous examples, these items can bring unwanted germs into a kitchen and contaminate otherwise pure food goods.
Little mistakes done by employees are, to an extent, unavoidable. Everyone is human and everyone makes mistakes. However, you as manager need to limit these mistakes as much as you possibly can.
Reiterating and enforcing employee standards can help to do this.
Complying With Food Laws and Regulations
It can be difficult to stay on top of all the food laws and regulations your restaurant needs to keep up with. The above tips can help to set yourself up for success.
Need more advice for running your business? Check out the rest of our blog for more.
