Kitchen Safety Tips
by Alyice Edrich
1. Supervise young children and first-time chefs. Never let your child
cook alone.
2. Develop patience. Your children will make fewer mistakes when they
are enjoying the process and not worrying about getting yelled at.
3. Handle kitchen products properly. Don't assume your children will
know what to do with kitchen products just by watching you in the kitchen.
Take the time to explain how each product works, as it's needed for each
recipe.
4. Understand fire safety. Explain how the fire extinguisher
works, how to put out a grease fire, and when to call 911.
5. Wear short sleeves. Long sleeves have a chance of catching
fire or falling into hot grease or boiling water.
6. Wear an apron. Aprons help protect clothes and add extra
padding in case of spilt hot water, splattered oil, etc.
7. Use oven mitts. Never use a towel to move hot pans because
the loose parts of the towel can fall onto a hot burner and catch on
fire. Oven mitts are safer because they help your children hold onto
the handle of a hot pan more securely.
8. Wash your hands. Hands carry germs and can contaminate food.
9. Keep pan handles facing in and over countertops. Pan handles
should never extend over the hot stove and definitely not out towards
the floor where someone could bump the handle and spill a pot of hot
food on him.
10. Never leave food unattended. Unwatched pots can spill over
causing fires and other kitchen hazards.
11. Clean up spills. Serious injuries occur when others slip and
fall because of wet floors or foreign objects, so make sure your
children understand the importance of cleaning up a spill as it
occurs. (Always have a mop or rag handy.)
12. Speed clean ups. Teach your children to clean while they wait
for the next stage in preparing the food (i.e. water boils, soup
simmers, etc.).
13. Never eat raw meats or poultry. Raw poultry can lead to food
poisoning (i.e. salmonella).
14. Wash surfaces where raw meats and poultry touched. Surfaces
touched by raw meat should be cleaned before placing another food
product on that surface to prevent cross contamination.
15. Keep raw food separate from cooked food. Never place cooked
food back on a plate that once contained raw food.
16. Metal and microwaves don't mix. Any object that contains
metal or aluminum should not be placed into a microwave because doing
so could cause a fire.
And finally, listen to your children. Making your children cook
foods they don't like could cause them to cook out of anger, become
careless in the kitchen, and in the end get seriously hurt.
If one of your children shows enthusiasm when you ask him to help
bake a cake, stir up a batch of cookies, or knead dough but enters
the kitchen kicking and screaming at the mention of helping you cook
meat or a side-dish, don't force him to cook the meal—not yet
anyway. Sometimes, children need to start off doing what they love
in the kitchen and then graduate into cooking other food items. If
you push too hard, you could turn your child off of cooking forever.
About The Author:
Alyice Edrich is the author of the highly praised daycare e-book, Tid-
Bits For In-Home Daycare Providers. If you like small children and
want to stay home with your children, but don't want to deal with
home party plans, inventory, or sales people, you could enjoy a
career as a home daycare provider. Learn more:
http://thedabblingmum.com/ebookstore