If you own or manage a restaurant, you know how important it is to manage your overhead costs. In particular, maintaining and extending the life of your industrial cooking gear can help you consistently produce quality food and save you some serious money.

Here's a quick guide to help you increase the life of your industrial pots and pans.

Pots

Just because industrial pots are designed to weather continuous bouts of extreme heat doesn't mean that they are indestructible.

Hot While Still Hot

When a hot pot is thrust into cold water, it will contract and flex minutely. Over time, these minute flexes and contractions can cause them to warp and crack. One of the easiest ways to extend the life of your pots is to clean them with hot water while they are still hot from cooking. By applying hot water with a simple degreasing agent, your kitchen staff can quickly clean the messiest pots before food has a chance to set or the pot has a chance to cool too drastically.

Foil Base (Inside and Out)

Being exposed to an open flame will scortch and burn even the toughest surfaces. Aside from discoloration, a blackened pot bottom can encourage oxidation, which will tarnish stainless steel. You can avoid this blackening from forming by adding heavy-duty foil to the base of your pots before each new day of cooking. Furthermore, you can add layer of heavy-duty foil to the inside of your pot to prevent stews, sauces, and other recipes from clinging to the bottom of the pot. This not only makes them easier to clean, saving time for your kitchen staff, but it also prevents damaging scrapping on your pots.

Lids

Industrial pots aren't nearly as useful without tight-fitting lids. Unfortunately, even a minor ding in a lid can compromise its ability to trap steam and maintain consistent cooking temperatures. One way to avoid damaged lids is by having your kitchen staff hand wash lids and store them from hanging or slotted shelves, which will prevent them from being stacked on top of each other. 

Pans

Season Regularly

Great pans are seasoned, which makes them virtually non-stick and helps them heat evenly. Although you might assume that constant cooking would serve to continually season industrial pans, you be forgetting that they are being washed constantly too. With each washing, particularly if your staff uses a powerful dish detergent, a little of the pan's seasoning diminishes. The easiest way to ensure that your industrial pans stay seasoned is by drying them in a hot oven every night. Not only is the process quick, but it will also increase the non-stick patina your cooks need to produce quality food consistently.

Storage

One of the biggest mistakes industrial kitchens often make is improperly storing their pans. When pans are stacked on top of each other, they rub surfaces, exert extra pressure on the sides, and trap water between the pan surfaces. Over time, each of these stresses can drastically reduce the life of your pans. The best way to store pans is to hang them. Creating a hanging pan system should allow your dishwasher to quickly store your pans, while giving your cooks easy access to them when they need them.

Soak, Not Scrub

Scrubbing your pans is almost unavoidable. However, this constant stress can wear out the metal, which can cause your pans to break down quickly. A better way to tackle difficult cooking messes is by soaking. Soaking your pans right after your cooks are done cooking with them will assist your dishwashing staff in getting the pans clean, dried, and ready for cooking again.

For more information about restaurant equipment supplies and how to maintain them, contact a supplier like Louis Wohl & Sons Inc.