How to Organize Your Commercial Kitchen & Cold Storage

Keeping all parts of your commercial kitchen organized is an important key to a successful restaurant. One of the most crucial areas to organize is your cold storage spaces, such as walk-in refrigerators and freezers. To keep your kitchen running smoothly, take a look at our tips to organizing your cold storage.

Basic Organization Tips

Before you get started with fully organizing your restaurant’s cold storage spaces, there are some basic, easy-to-follow organization principles and tips to utilize during the process.

Mise en Place

The mise en place—or “everything in its place”—principle is a rule many restaurants follow to organize cold storage, dry storage and supplies storage. Mise en place sounds exactly like what you think: everything should be kept and put back in its original place. When your staff is trained to follow the mise en place principle, your storage spaces will stay organized and your commercial kitchen will be easier to manage.

The FIFO Rule

FIFO stands for “first in-first out,” and it’s another organizational rule that’s well-known in the commercial kitchen sphere. The FIFO rule is used when organizing and using consumable goods to reduce spoilage and loss by dictating that the first product that’s placed on the shelf should be used first. Once the first product on the shelf is used, the item that’s behind is now first up. When stocking, make sure the newest items received go behind what’s first on the shelf so that that item up front can be used first. This ensures that consumables are used prior to their expiration date, which minimizes waste and over-ordering.

Labeling is Key

When you are ordering and using produce and frozen foods, it’s essential that you label everything you put into cold storage. From expiration dates, to what the item is and when it was placed in cold storage are crucial pieces of information that can be included on a label.

Organizing Your Cold Storage

Now that you know some basic principles about cold storage organization, now it’s time to actually get to it. Organizing you cold storage is simple so long as you follow these protocols; these steps are designed to keep your food not only organized, but safe to consume.

Storing Food Products

• Storing meat – Store meats on lowest shelf to prevent dripping and cross-contamination. Meats should also be stored in food pans with lids or plastic wrap to prevent spillage
• Storing produce – Produce should be stored away from the cooler fan, out of the light, and away from strong odors. This will ensure that the produce stays fresh and retains proper taste. Storing away from the fan also prevents freezer burn if it’s a frozen item.
• Storing cooked foods – Store cooked, ready-to-eat foods and meat on higher racks.

Cold Storage Environment

• Control the temperature – Refrigerators should be kept at 40 degrees F or below, and freezers should be kept at 0 degrees F.
• Where not to store – Do not store anything on the floor. Make sure that items on the lowest shelf are at least 6 inches from the floor.
• Give some space – Provide adequate space between items so they remain properly cooled. Ideally, products in cold storage should be kept 3-6 inches from walls and between each item.

For more tips on keeping your commercial kitchen organized or maintaining your refrigerator, turn to Parts Town for advice and tricks to keeping your commercial kitchen in tip-top shape.