A commercial kitchen’s design should not only be beautiful but also efficient. The kitchen is the heart and soul of a restaurant, something that Dawnvale truly understands.
A commercial kitchen’s design is paramount to the restaurant’s success. The above statement is especially true when you consider the technology used in kitchens today.
The kitchen’s design should improve the restaurant’s efficiency by streamline work flow in the kitchen. The staff should have easy access to the food and kitchen equipment to make and deliver food even during the busiest of times.
The following are the factors to consider in commercial kitchen design:
Flexibility
Your kitchen design should allow for any changes in menu and staff that may occur. The kitchen space should be able to change with the menu.
Staff can shift around to work in different positions while storage facilities can also be shifted to provide easy access to cooking ingredients.
Moving parts like trolleys and moving counters are a great option for kitchen flexibility.
Efficiency
A commercial kitchen should only be as large as it has to be. Considering the rent the owner will pay on the property, you want to leave space for as many customers as possible.
Ensure certain elements of the kitchen can be used for several tasks such as equipment and workstations. Efficiency in a commercial kitchen also pertains to storage. You should ensure that you can store all the necessary kitchen equipment and ingredients you need in as little space as possible.
Kitchen workflow
When designing a kitchen, the chaotic nature of kitchen activities should be foremost on your mind. The designer should ensure that the kitchen’s design promotes workflow as much as possible.
Designing a kitchen by function is the best way to achieve maximum workflow. There should be seamless movement of food from storage to the counter where the servers will pick up the meals.
Sanitation
The kitchen design should use space efficiently but also allow space for the entire kitchen to be cleaned. A health code violation is the cause of most restaurants’ demise.
Every part of the kitchen should be designed with food safety in mind. The washing stations should be ideally placed for staff to retrieve clean dishes and to get clean cooking equipment as fast as possible.
The washing stations should also be large enough to avoid a pile up of dirty dishes. They should also allow for several cleaners to use them to minimise use of space.
Efficient energy use
The kitchen is the part of the restaurant that uses the most energy. There are cookers, dishwashers, dryers and heaters constantly at use in the kitchen.
Successful kitchen design ensures that energy in the kitchen is efficiently utilised. The design should put cold storage equipment and hot cooking equipment separate so that appliances in the kitchen function optimally.
Maintenance
Good commercial kitchen design leaves plenty of room for kitchen maintenance. In fact, not leaving space for maintenance is one of the main mistakes made by commercial kitchen designers which can cost you a lot if you need to replace equipment that could be repaired.
Modular kitchen equipment is a good idea to this end. If you can move certain equipment around, you can create space for maintenance of other appliances.