The When and Why of Restaurant Kitchen Hood Cleaning

Many restaurant owners have difficulties understanding how essential kitchen exhaust cleaning is. Also commonly referred to as hood cleaning, it is an important process to follow as a commercial kitchen manager for the safety of your customers and employees and because it is required by law.

As a part of the food industry, you should know that all commercial cooking establishments including restaurants, hospitals, hotels, office cafeterias and other food service locations are required by law to keep their kitchens and the surrounding building smoke, fume and grease free. For the same reasons, these cooking establishments must have a kitchen exhaust system of hood and ductwork over their cooking equipment to push the exhaust smoke, grease-laden vapors and fumes out of the building.

Having a kitchen duct well installed over your cooking equipment is not the only essential part of kitchen maintenance. The interior of the duct work gets dirtied by the grease residue, which needs to be cleaned periodically. The grease that builds up in the system is highly flammable and can cause disastrous and dangerous kitchen fires if left unchecked. This is the reason why cleaning exhaust hoods, ducts, fans and filters is not only essential for safety, but is also required by the law under fire code NFPA 96.

Most of the latest exhaust systems available for restaurant kitchens have a fire suppression system within the hood and at the mouth of the vertical duct for safety. This security is not enough, as it does not provide any suppression in the vertical and horizontal ductwork or the fan on the roof. In the case of a fire, the flames can spread through the duct and to the rest of the building. This is the reason why it is essential to properly maintain the kitchen exhaust hood system. It avoids nuisances like odors, and major dangers like fires.

With an understanding of the potential risks of an unclean hood, you must schedule its regular cleaning and maintenance. How often the exhaust system must be cleaned is clearly dependent on the volume of cooking and the type of cooking done in the kitchen. While the volume element can be determined easily by most managers, it is the type of food made in the kitchen that is difficult to understand and interpret for exhaust system cleaning. Here is what the NFPA 96 says about the frequency in its 11.4 Exhaust System Inspection Schedule:

“Systems serving solid fuel cooking operations – Monthly
Systems serving high-volume cooking operations such as 24-hour cooking, charbroiling, or wok cooking – Quarterly
Systems serving moderate-volume cooking operations – Semiannually
Systems serving low-volume cooking operations, such as churches, day camps, seasonal businesses, or senior centers – Annually”

If you are unsure about the frequency of cleaning and other maintenance work your kitchen requires, you can rely on the advice of a reputable and certified kitchen exhaust hood inspector. You can also call upon trusted restaurant kitchen exhaust cleaning and maintenance services. They have skilled cleaners who will easily analyze and plan your cleaning requirements, as well as the maintenance cleaning frequency. You should take advantage of the fact that many cleaning services will give you a cleaning estimate at no cost. Once you have a cleaning and maintenance schedule of hood filters in place, then you should do a yearly evaluation of the schedule, keeping in mind any changes in the cooking load or food types.

The writer is associated with Nelbud Services Group Inc., the leading cleaning and maintenance service provider to the food industry. They have been providing restaurant kitchen hood cleaning services for more than 30 years.