Design Your Restaurant for Hygiene and Comfort
Design for Hygiene
On 24th February, 2009 one of the leading restaurants in the world – The Fat Duck, located in a county near London, shut down operations for more than a fortnight because of a health scare. Forty of its customers had complained of getting ill after a meal. The management could not find the cause. They closed down operations and called for a health inspection. No reason was discovered. The Fat Duck is reputed to have self-imposed the most rigorous process of health monitoring. The cause was never found out and the restaurant was re-opened in mid-March, after incurring a loss of 100,000 pounds in lost revenues.
Hygiene and health issues can never be taken for granted, and hence a deep concern about it from the design stage will pay rewards later.
In India, water-based pollutants and vectors are a big cause of spreading disease and sickness. You should consider installing a reverse osmosis (RO) plant to ensure that food items and crockery are washed and prepared in treated water.
Ensure that the flows of food under preparation and clean plates do not overlap in anyway with the removal of dirty plates and leftover food and disposal of waste. Ensure that stations where raw meat and fish are prepared do not overlap with vegetables and fruit, to prevent cross-contamination. Set up separate sinks for kitchen staff to wash hands in the back of the house area. Institute surprise checks to ensure that processes set up for hygiene are strictly followed. In matters of hygiene, prevention is the only solution. The example of the Fat Duck tells us that finding a cure is too expensive.
Design for Comfort
As with most production spaces, special attention should be paid to design proper ventilation. The intense operations of a restaurant kitchen will call for chimney hoods, exhaust blowers and ducting to ensure that all smoke and cooking odours are directed outside. Good ventilation will enable that conditions do not get too intense and impact the preparation and cooking processes.
It would be useful to designate areas for staff where they could keep their belongings and, if possible, change and wash up. In full-service restaurants, staff would need a separate restroom. This will clear other areas for smooth operations.
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