Cleaning, step by step
Two distinct operations, commonly confused.
- Remove debrisScrape and wipe. Sanitiser cannot penetrate food residue.
- Wash with detergentHot water and soap lifts grease and most microbes.
- RinseDetergent residue can deactivate some sanitisers.
- SanitiseAppropriate product, left for its stated contact time.
- Air dryCloths recontaminate. Air drying is more hygienic.
Contact time
- Most sanitisers need 30 seconds to several minutes wet
- Wiping immediately does almost nothing
- Read the label — the time is on it
A kitchen sponge is among the most contaminated objects in a home. Replace weekly, or microwave it damp for a minute.
Questions about the Cleaning poster
- What’s on the Cleaning poster?
- 5 numbered steps, with a full worked run-through. Two distinct operations, commonly confused. Remove debris — Scrape and wipe. Sanitiser cannot penetrate food residue.; Wash with detergent — Hot water and soap lifts grease and most microbes.; Rinse — Detergent residue can deactivate some sanitisers.; Sanitise — Appropriate product, left for its stated contact time.; Air dry — Cloths recontaminate. Air drying is more hygienic.. A kitchen sponge is among the most contaminated objects in a home. Replace weekly, or microwave it damp for a minute.
- Who is the Cleaning poster for?
- Cleaning belongs to the Kitchen section rather than to a school year, because food is not something one grade owns. Anyone learning food safety can pin it up — a beginner, a student mid-course, or someone revising years later.
- When should you use the Cleaning poster?
- Clean first, then sanitise. Disinfectant on a dirty surface does very little. A wall chart earns its place by being glanceable from where the work is happening, so Cleaning belongs on the wall where that food work actually happens, within glancing distance, rather than filed away.
- What other posters go with Cleaning?
- Barbecue Safety, Preserving Safely and Cross-Contamination sit alongside Cleaning in the Kitchen section. Printed together they make a wall rather than a single sheet, which is how a reference set actually gets used.Barbecue SafetyPreserving SafelyCross-Contamination
- Is the Cleaning poster free to download and print?
- Yes. Cleaning downloads as a free PDF with no account, no email and no watermark, like everything else in the Kitchen section. Print as many copies as you like for a home, a classroom, a library or a tutoring group; reselling the file is the only thing the licence rules out.Read the licence
- What size does the Cleaning poster print at?
- Cleaning is a vector PDF laid out for US Letter, and prints on A4 with Fit to page — the same file, no separate download. Because every mark on it is drawn rather than photographed, it stays sharp enlarged to A3, A2 or A1 at a copy shop. Colour carries emphasis only, so a greyscale print of Cleaning loses nothing.Printing guide
Related posters
Charts that sit alongside Cleaning on the same wall.
Browse every Kitchen poster, or start from the full catalogue.