Food Service Sanitizer - Cleaning and sanitizing of food-contact surface

With hygiene a vital component in any industry, it is an integral component of food service sector so people belonging to this industry strive hard to meet the prevailing hygiene standards. When it comes to cleaning and sanitizing food-contact surface they need to pay extra care and attention especially while choosing the cleaning agents as glass cleaners, metal cleaners, or tile cleaners, though cleaners cannot be used for cleaning food-contact surface. For those wondering what is food-contact surface, it is nothing but the surface of an utensil or equipment that food comes in contact with, be it due to draining or dripping.

While choosing a cleaning agent, first thing to notice is whether the label indicates the particular product can be used for food-contact surface. And, the next vital thing to consider is a cleaning agent that makes the cleaning job easier. There are four different types of cleaning agents available in the market, say detergents, solvents, abrasive, and acid cleaners.

Detergent has surfactants to that optimally reduce the tension between the surface and soil by softening the latter. Solvent cleaners mainly contains grease-dissolving agents and hence good to be used on surface where grease is burnt. The third type of cleaners are good to remove soils that the other types of cleaners cannot, such as scales on the dishwashers. Finally, abrasive cleaners ideal to cleaning accumulated soils. That's the brief about food-contact surface cleaners.

Now coming to sanitizing, it is done to keep the surface free of micro-organisms, which the cleaner alone cannot do. Up to 99.99% reduction of different micro-organisms is that are harmful to human is considered to be the safe level. Sanitizing is done through various methods, like heating, radiation, and specialised sanitizers. But before sanitizing the surface it needs to be cleaned properly with no residue or soil left behind, otherwise the sanitizer cannot react well on the organic matter. And, hence the sanitizing results may not be very appreciative.

The heat sanitizing method is done in three different ways, cleaning with hot water, exposing the food-contact surface to steam of recommended temperature, or applying hot air of 180 degree F. Another effective way of sanitizing is via ultraviolet radiation, but this not common in food industry except in packing areas. Chemicals or food service sanitizer are widely used today as they proven to be very effective. As a result there is a plenty of food service sanitizers in various forms are available in the market.

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