THERE are still more than a few of us around who remember the bad old days when restaurants employed human dish washers—or plongeurs as these unfortunate people were known—who were paid a pittance to stand for hours in an elbow-deep tub of hot (or, more likely, lukewarm) sudsy water to ready the tableware for the next batch of diners.

And those were the good restaurants. Just thinking about how the others coped (or, perhaps, didn’t cope) is enough to make most of us, in today’s hygiene-conscious society, shake in our boots. (It’s all graphically described in that wonderful book, Down and out in Paris and London by George Orwell.)

Thankfully, we’ve come a long way from ‘them dark ‘ol days’. Undoubtedly, cleaning up is still one of the most stressful and disliked jobs in any commercial kitchen; however today there are enough smart dishwashing and cleaning machines to make life easier for busy management and staff.

Not only are the latest machines quick and hygienic, many are also designed to save on energy and water usage.

When the Ettalong Beach Memorial Club on Sydney’s Central Coast was demolished last year and replaced with a new club, the kitchens received special attention.

A dishwashing unit, close to 10 metres long, was installed along one wall of the kitchen and the club already has plans to install a second unit in the near future to cope with its expanding food operations.

The club already caters for hundreds of a la carte meals a day in its fine-dining restaurant, Half Tide Rocks, while there is also a cafe, bistro and function rooms for up to 1,200 people.

The club’s executive chef Clinton Brown says the new dishwashing unit sorts out dirty table and cooking ware into pots, crockery, cutlery, and so on, at the start of the process and sets washing temperatures automatically according to food authority and HACCP hygiene requirements (80+ degrees) for washing and rinsing.

When this cycle is complete, the ware is steamed and is allowed to sit and dry, so there is no need to use hand-drying cloths that can cause cross-contamination.

“We also have special sinks with built in elements to keep water at the appropriate temperatures and colour-coded automatic dispensers for chemicals that ensure the correct mix and amount,” Brown says.

The unit, which automatically shuts down until it senses a new batch of dirty ware ready for wash, has allowed the club to achieve considerable savings in energy and, even more importantly considering current restrictions, the unit also saves on water usage, he says.

The club’s policy towards saving water has been implemented further throughout the property to include more general kitchen clean-ups including walls, floors and grills – duties it now contracts out to a steam cleaning company.

While not all establishments require a dishwashing unit as large as the one installed at Ettalong Beach, every business needs to ensure the same level of attention is accorded to food safety and hygiene requirements.

Fortunately, today’s leading manufacturers (like Hobart Food Equipment which installed the Ettalong Beach Memorial Club unit) are now bringing out smart commercial dishwashers suitable for small, and large, food operators.

The company says restaurants and cafes that are looking to install new machines should make sure that the particular unit they purchase can provide the best possible solutions to the problems that they are experiencing.

Before opting for a particular machine, ask some questions. Will it save on energy and water usage? Is it HACCP compliant? Is it user-friendly? Is it easy to clean? Will it make the whole cleaning process easier on staff?

The final question is important not only from a productivity point of view but also from an occupational health and safety standpoint. There has been a recent move away from under-the-counter washing machines that require staff to bend over and lift racks of dishes, glasses and cutlery, which can cause back injuries.

Today, this is eliminated in some machines by the use of frames to lift the unit to a better working height. Other operators are opting for hood-type units with lighter hoods and easier opening mechanisms.

It is also important to ask if a machine could monitor and report on each washing cycle should it become necessary in today’s litigtious climate to prove that the correct HACCP requirements were met during the process. It is also important to check that if the unit, by some mistake, does not reach the required sanitising rinse of 82+ degrees, it has a built-in low temperature cutout to alert the user.

Some food operators complain that cutlery washing is one of their biggest headaches as each piece often requires the long process of manual drying and polishing to remove fingerprints and watermarks.

Hit Equipment is about to launch a new cutlery washing machine that, when combined with the company’s cutlery polisher, can solve the problem and achieve considerable savings in wages alone.

Hit Equipment director Erik Pizzorini says restaurants can move from dirty cutlery to dry and shining polished flatware in less than two minutes when using the washer and polisher.

The time-consuming hand drying and polishing (which can involve hours of labour each day) are completely eliminated, he says.

“The cutlery is free of fingerprints and watermarks, is properly dried and sanitised. And the units can even incorporate an automatic and hygienic cutlery wrapping machine.”

The company also supplies a smaller polishing unit, suitable for smaller cafes and bistros. Apart from dish and cutlery washing, the other big headache in commercial kitchens is general cleaning.

To meet today’s high standards, this involves massive outlays for energy and water usage and staff time for many operators. One solution is steam cleaning.

Steam Australia proprietor Mark Rosenberg says there are a number of factors fuelling a drive towards the use of steam cleaning in commercial kitchens.

“Steam cleaning machines are effective and safe, save on time and labour, use no chemicals and use only a small amount of water and energy to generate the blasts of dry steam which penetrate to very corner and crevice, sanitising and killing harmful germs in seconds,” Rosenberg says.

Rosenberg also says apart from food safety and hygiene and the environmentally friendly aspects of steam, when compared to traditional mop and bucket cleaning, the OH&S benefits alone are significant enough to persuade food operators to turn to steam cleaning machines.

“The steam removes all floor grease which causes so many accidents,” Rosenberg says. “And there’s no need for back strain as bending and/or stretching is eliminated even for the hardest to reach spots. The machines have long handles that mean that the operator can work from a comfortable stand-up position.”