This document provides tips for preparing to cook and working as a team in the kitchen. It advises reading the entire recipe beforehand to ensure you have the proper ingredients and tools. It also recommends understanding the directions, allowing enough time, and checking ingredients before starting. Additional tips include sanitizing surfaces, rotating jobs, cleaning as you go, picking recipes all agree on, keeping an eye on cooking food, replenishing supplies, and maintaining a safe environment.

1. Preparing to Cook
– Cooking Tips

2. Read the Recipe
• Read the recipe from start to finish
before you start and make sure you
have all the ingredients and tools
you need.

3. Understand
• Make sure you understand the
directions and that the recipe is not
too complicated for your abilities.

4. Time
• Make sure you have enough time to
finish cooking the food before it is
supposed to be served.

5. Ingredient Check
• Pull out all of your ingredients first
to make sure you have enough for
the recipe.

6. Prepare yourself
• Wear an apron if you are wearing nice
clothing and tie your hair back if it is
long.
• Remove and jewellery that can trap
bacteria.
• Make sure you have all the proper
cooking equipment that you need for the
recipe.

7. Sanitize your work area
• Cleanse the counter and work area
with warm water and a disinfectant
and wash again when you are
switching products on the surface –
raw meat, fish, and egg products.

8. Tips for Cooking
as a Team

9. Rotate jobs each time so that
you learn different skills
• Gatherer
• Collects all the food supplies needed for the
recipe
• Measures out ingredients
• Chopper
• Rinses the produce and chops it for the recipe
• Cooker
• Cooks the items on the stove
• Stirs
• Adds spices

10. Kitchen Duties cont’d
• Dish Washer
• Wash all preparation equipment before eating
• Rinse and stack dishes beside the sink
• Fill one sink with HOT water and soap
• Fill the other sink with HOT water and a splash of
bleach for rinsing.
• Clean and dry drain traps and put them upside down
behind the clean sink.
• Dry sink, faucet and behind sink area.
• Hang rubber gloves to dry
• Put dishcloth in laundry basket.

11. Kitchen Duties cont’d
• Dish Dryer
• Dry all preparation equipment before eating
• Dry dishes and put back in correct location
• Dry dish rack and tray and put away under sink
• Put sponge and dish soap in dry dish tub
• Put dish towels into laundry basket

12. Kitchen Duties cont’d
• Unit Manager
• Set table if eating during class time
• Help dishwasher rinse dishes and stack by sink
• Wipe down counters, backsplash, stove, tables and chairs
• Wipe down outside of cupboards and drawers
• Wipe down and put away unit equipment such as
blenders, hand mixers, and pastry boards
• Put dishcloths and tea towels into laundry basket
• Call adult over for unit check when clean-up is completed.
• Keeps track of cooking lab timing

13. Kitchen Duties cont’d
• Special Duties
• If someone is absent in the unit, complete their lab duty.
• Fold laundry
• Hang aprons
• Clean and put away supplies
• Empty dishwasher and put away all the equipment.
Do not leave the kitchen until all the work is done!

14. Be polite, do not yell or put
down others.
• Use the golden rule: “Treat others the
way you want to be treated.”
• Causing conflict can add to the stress in
the kitchen and can contribute to
mistakes.
• If you need someone to do something,
ask nicely.

15. Clean as you go and during down
time between cooking
• If you clean as you go, there will
be less to clean up at the end.
•It takes up less time if you clean
while the food is cooking.

16. Pick a recipe that everyone can
agree on
• Picking a recipe that someone dislikes or
is allergic to in your group is not fair
since they will be putting in the work to
help yet do not get to enjoy the
outcome.
• If there are certain ingredients in a
recipe that someone doesn’t like, omit it
or make a special portion just for them.

17. Keep an eye on the cooking food
• Make sure someone has an eye on
the cooking food so that it doesn’t
boil over or over-bake.

18. If you run out of supplies, add it
to the grocery list.
• If you use up ingredients, make sure
you let everyone know and add it to
the grocery list.
• If you do not tell anyone that you
are missing ingredients, then they
may have to make an unnecessary
trip to the grocery store in the midst
of cooking.

19. Keep your partners safe
• Pour, mix and handle foods over the counters to
reduce spills and slips.
• Turn pot handles away from the edge of the
counter so that they are not accidentally knocked
over by someone else.
• Put used knives beside the sink instead of in the
murky sink water.
• Carry knives blades facing down.