What can I do to prevent a kitchen fire?

In additional to annual inspections of your fire protection systems and regular cleaning of your kitchen hood vent, there are other things that you can do to prevent fires in your commercial kitchen:

• Keep your restaurant kitchen clean and organized—many commercial kitchens have huge piles of kindling basically waiting to be ignited. Oil and grease on the walls and kitchen hood, cardboard boxes and wooden pallets from deliveries, the accumulation of food waste and packaging that tends to build up all increase the chance of a kitchen fire. Be sure to keep a tidy and clean kitchen to minimize this risk.
• Mind the grease in your commercial kitchen—empty grease traps on flat top grills and kitchen hoods and replace the grease in your deep fryers regularly to prevent it from flaring up. Also make sure you clean off the grease that accumulates on your walls and your hood—flare ups from cooking can occur and ignite this grease, which can spread quickly through your entire kitchen in minutes.