The Kitchen Exhaust Hood and Its Filters

Author: Matthew J. Goudge

The kitchen exhaust hood, also called the kitchen exhaust fan, is one of the most important parts of any restaurant kitchen.  Because it is an integral part of any commercial kitchen, it should always be kept clean at all times, and it is the Stewarding Department's duty to make sure that the cleanliness of the kitchen exhaust hood is maintained, especially its filters.

Importance of Kitchen Exhaust Hoods

As stated above, the kitchen exhaust hood is very important:

1. It helps circulate the air inside the hot kitchen.  Fire is needed to cook the food, but it also increases the temperature inside the kitchen.  A very hot and humid kitchen atmosphere can definitely increase the tension inside the kitchen.  For this reason, the kitchen exhaust hood will suck the hot air out and help the air circulate around the kitchen better.
2. It helps remove smoke quickly.  When you cook, smoke appears.  The odor of the smoke and the smoke itself will fill up the kitchen.  Now, to quickly remove the smoke, commercial kitchens make use of kitchen exhaust fans.  Not only will it help dissipate the smoke and its odors quickly, but it will also help in the prevention of smoke stains coating the kitchen walls and equipments.

Cleaning the Kitchen Exhaust Hoods and Its Filters

In time and with repeated and prolonged use, the kitchen exhaust hoods and its filters accumulate dust, grime, bacteria, etc.  Because of this, it is very important to make sure that these are cleaned from time to time.

In commercial kitchens, it is recommended that the kitchen stewards give the kitchen exhaust hoods and its filters a thorough cleaning weekly.  Here are the common guidelines on cleaning them.

For the filters:

1. The first thing that should be done is to remove the filters.
2. You then have to fill up the cleaning tank for the hood filter with water, at least 3/4 of the tank, and once done, you can now attach the steam pipe line to the water-filled tank.
3. After connecting the two, pour in caustic soda into the tank and then put the filters into the tank.  The proportion of the caustic soda should be 1:10.  This means that for every 10 liters of water, it should contain I kg of caustic soda.
4. Once done, you can now open the valve for the steam pipe line and leave the filters in the tank for half an hour.
5. After half an hour of soaking the filter, you can now remove it from the tank and then wash it off with clean, running water.  Use a detergent solution as well as a hand brush to thoroughly give the filter a good scrubbing, after which, you can now rinse it off with clean water.
6. Lastly, use a clean cloth to wipe the excess water off.

For the kitchen exhaust hoods:

1. It is not that difficult to clean the kitchen exhaust hoods as all you have to do is to make use of a detergent solution as well as a scrubbing pad to give the hoods a thorough cleaning.
2. Once done, you can simply wipe the excess fluid off.

Image Credit: qrbiz.com

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/restaurant-reviews-articles/the-kitchen-exhaust-hood-and-its-filters-4530031.html

About the Author

Chef Matthew, the owner of ProChef360 Blog, is an expert in culinary arts. 
He is after all an outstanding chef, having had worked in some of the finest resorts, hotels and restaurants in the world.

His interest, however, in social media was awakened when he started his own websites. 
Over the years, he took it upon himself to learn everything he can about social media.

He endeavored to discover the secrets behind generating huge traffic and leads for his websites.

He studied the secrets behind generating sales by piggy-backing on high-traffic social media sites.

Over time, he has developed 77 techniques on how to generate huge amount of traffic through the use of social media.