Safety and Sanitation in Cooking, Baking, and Storing Food


Personal Protective Equipment

PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) is the specialized clothing or equipment worn by workers as protection against becoming contaminated or contaminating others. Construction sites require hard hats and hard-toed boots; the kitchen (especially the commercial kitchen) has its particular PPE, too.

Food service PPE includes

  • disposable gloves
  • aprons or covering of clothing
  • hair covering
  • disposable masks, especially in healthcare facilities (or if the kitchen worker has a cough)

These types of Personal Protective Equipment prevent contact with potentially infectious materials by placing physical barriers between the infectious material and the worker. Thus, the worker intends to protect others as well as himself.

Blood, saliva, or other bodily fluids may carry infectious materials such as

  • hepatitis C
  • HIV
  • other blood-borne or bodily fluid pathogens

Infectious materials can be spread by food service workers through

  • open cuts
  • improper sanitation, such as tasting a food and returning the spoon to the food
  • improper sanitation procedures, including failure to wash hands effectively

In food service, food must be kept safe and pathogens must not be passed to other people.