Washing is one of the most time-consuming tasks in a commercial kitchen but electric dishwashers have made life easier in recent years. However, dishwashers are not able to support the cleaning of huge pots, pans, trays or tubs and staff had to rely on doing it by hand; usually involving a 3-step process of scrubbing, rinsing and sanitising these large items. To ease the manual labour and improve operations, equipment dedicated to pot washing includes:
RECIRCULATING SOAKER
Best described as a big water pump built into a pot sink, the basis of the idea is the movement of water around soiled pots and pans to loosen and wash away food particles and dirt; effective for light to medium soiling. However, heavy soil and deposits from baking would still need to be scrubbed off first before using the soaker.
Operators can choose to attach a unit to the existing potsink with some minimal retrofitting via an electrical outlet. There is also a recirculating soaker that does not require any modifications done to the sink and is easily installed by using the existing drain hole as the water inlet to recirculate, agitate and heat water. You might also want to consider units that have built-in heaters as water that is constantly kept warm aids in loosening soil. Attaching a soaker unit to the pot sink may be a viable option for smaller operations but is not as practical when it comes to operations that use a lot of big pots, pans and trays. In this case, investing in an entire specialised pot sink is a better option as units can be custom built to fit various types of operations and available space. There is also an option to include built-in waste disposers, drain boards, shelves and extra scraper sinks into the recirculating soaker.
POWER SCRUBBER
A less complex option, this is a pot brush with an electric motor which is typically mounted on the wall of the pot sink and connected to a flexible shaft to scrub the soiled cookware. Usually, a variety of brushes and scrubbers are available and can be attached and detached from the shaft to cater to specific washing needs. These additional attachments include wire brushes for tougher soil or plastic composite head suitable for scrubbing off baked-on carbon deposits from baking pans.
POTWASHING GRANULES
To simplify potwashing, there is an option of using specially formulated granules together with the potwashing machine. These granules eliminate the need to pre-soak or scrub the pots as they work by blasting off food residue, bakedon deposits when coming into contact with water that is pumped with high pressure. While still requiring detergent, the amount used is much less and granules can be reused depending on the frequency of washing. The only criteria is making sure that adequate amount of granules are used for effective cleaning and checking the granule level daily. By using the manufacturer’s memo system, users can keep tabs on when they need to change the worn out granules.
** Special thanks to MEIKO for providing image of potwasher depicted in this article.
