Is your kitchen as clean as you think it is?
Is your kitchen as clean as you think it is? You might wipe the countertops when you’re finished making dinner, or mop your tile floor when you drop a piece of raw pork on it. But did you really kill the germs, or just make the mess a little more invisible?
Kitchen hygiene is important for several reasons. First off, you can spread germs, whether they be pathogens, bacteria or the common cold, if you don’t disinfect dishes, countertops and floors often enough. Secondly, no one wants to eat in a kitchen that looks – or feels – like it’s filthy.
One of the best ways to keep your kitchen countertops and tiles clean is to change out your sponges once per day. When you spill something on the tile floor, use a different sponge or cloth to wipe it up than you just used to sweep crumbs off of your kitchen table.
Don’t rely on plain dish soap to wash away all the germs. Regular dish soap is not antibacterial. You need super-hot water or antibacterial cleansers to actually kill germs. Thus, you’ll kill germs on dishes when you wash them in a piping hot dishwasher, but just dunking the cutting board in lukewarm soapy water won’t kill the bacteria and pathogens that you just spread all over while you trimmed raw meat.
Do you ever stop to think how many germs you’re diffusing all around your kitchen when you touch the handles of cabinets and the refrigerator with sticky or dirty fingers? Then what happens the next time someone else touches that same handle? They pick up germs and spread them elsewhere! Kitchen hygiene is crucial in the kitchen because it helps prevent germs from spreading out past the kitchen and making people sick.
Now let’s talk a little bit about the floor – and tile floors especially. Tile floors look great in a kitchen, but they’ll reveal any spills and stains that might have landed there. You need to keep them cleansed with tile cleaner or a vinegar/water mixture and a mop to actually get them clean to the point where the spread of germs isn’t a problem.
The same goes for tile countertops and walls. Splatters from the cook top and dirty water sprayed from the sink onto the backsplash are all unsightly, not to mention germy. Clean these regularly with the same products you use to clean the tile floors in order to prevent spreading infectious agents.
Glass tiles: You might think glass only belongs in a bathroom. But if so, think again. Glass gives contemporary kitchens a sleek look that you could never hope to achieve with heavier glazed tiles. Clear glass goes well with white cabinets while glass in the browns and jewel tones coordinate nicely with wood cabinets. Glass is also an ideal look with shiny countertops, like granite and marble.
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