Kitchen Deep-Clean Checklist

Shut gas valves to flat top, six-burner, salamander, and char-grill. Wait until surfaces drop below 200°F before scraping — chemical degreaser flashes on a hot flat top.

Use a flat-top scraper at a 30° angle, then grill brick with grill cleaner. Rinse with water, dry, and re-season with a thin layer of canola or flax oil before cooldown.

Pull grates and soak in degreaser; brass-bristle brush the radiants. Inspect bristles before reinstall — loose wire-bristle fragments are a recurring foreign-object complaint and an FDA Food Code concern.

Pump oil through the filter and boil out the vat with fryer-cleaning solution if TPM exceeds 25%. Note the boil-out — never boil out with food residue still in the vat.

Transfer all time/temperature-controlled product to the prep walk-in or rented reefer. Track the move-out time — anything above 41°F for more than 4 hours per the FDA Food Code must be discarded.

Pull shelving and run through the dish pit. Wipe door gaskets with quat — torn or moldy gaskets are a frequent health-inspector citation and cause temperature drift.

Dust-clogged coils are the #1 cause of compressor failure and warm boxes. Vacuum monthly minimum on every low-boy and reach-in.

Run the unit empty for 30 minutes, then verify with a calibrated probe. Walk-in must read 41°F or below; freezer 0°F or below. Do not reload product until the reading confirms.

If product time-temp abused during the clean, discard and document on the waste log. The waste entry feeds back into MarginEdge or R365 for true food-cost accounting.

Pull all racks, stones, and trays from convection ovens, conveyor toasters, and rethermalizers. Soak in the three-bay with hot detergent solution.

Spray Carbon-Off or equivalent on cool interior surfaces; let dwell per SDS (typically 15-30 minutes). Ventilate the kitchen — fumes will set off the smoke detector if the hood is off.

Drain the wash and rinse tanks, run a delime cycle per the Hobart/Champion/Jackson manual. Lime scale on the rinse arms is what causes spotting and short rack times.

High-temp machines need 180°F at the manifold (160°F at the dish surface). Use a max-registering thermometer or temp-strip plate. Low-temp machines need chlorine at 50 ppm minimum at the rinse.

Call the dish-machine vendor (Ecolab, Auto-Chlor, or local rep) for same-day or next-morning service. Until repaired, switch to manual three-compartment warewashing with sanitizer at 200 ppm quat.

Anti-fatigue mats trap grease underneath; pressure-wash on the dock or in the mop room with a floor degreaser. Greasy mats are a slip hazard and a roach harborage.

Apply alkaline degreaser, agitate with a deck brush, and squeegee to the floor drain. Pay special attention to the fryer apron and dish pit splash zone.

Pour enzyme drain treatment (e.g., BioRem-2000) into each drain after closing. This is the difference between a kitchen that smells fresh on Monday open and one that doesn't.

Greasy ceiling tiles directly above the line are a fire-marshal flag. Replace tiles that are stained through; FRP panels wipe down with degreaser and rinse.

Look for droppings, gnaw marks, or live activity behind equipment and along the slab line. Note findings in the IPM log for the next Orkin/Ecolab visit.

Date-label everything per state code (most require open-date plus 7-day discard for ready-to-eat TCS). Pull anything past use-by — log to the waste sheet.

Nothing stored on the floor — all dry goods on shelving with at least 6 inches clearance per the FDA Food Code. Cardboard cases on the floor are an automatic citation.