In the restaurant industry, no one has a greater responsibility than the fry chef. This may seem like the easiest job in the kitchen to some, but the potential hazard that comes with frying means that the fry chef must always be on alert and work as a professional.

This is the standard in any great restaurant. However, the levels of maintenance and attention to detail give the fry chef one of the most difficult jobs to pull off daily consistently without causing any problems down the road. To give better insight into what this means, here are the dos and don’ts of a professional deep fryer that have to be maintained to keep a kitchen operational.

Keep Your Deep Fryer Clean at All Times

Anytime you’re dealing with oils of any kind, you must keep them contained as they tend to get messy. Oils contain properties that make them flammable and slippery. They can also stick to any surface and absorb into most materials of any kind, which makes them extremely volatile.

Deep fryers are no different in the respect that they must be cleaned and maintained daily. If they are not kept clean, then they could pose a very potential and serious hazard to anyone and everyone who encounters them. The slightest mistake could mean that the area housing the fryer could be set ablaze under the wrong circumstances if it isn’t properly managed by being thoroughly cleaned daily.

Make Sure To Have Your Fryer Regularly Inspected

At least every quarter of the fiscal year, your company or business should have your professional deep fryer inspected. This is for a few reasons. The most important is to ensure safety.

The second is to find out whether the fryer is operational. Now, to be clear, safety and operation go hand in hand but aren’t the same thing. Saying that the fryer is safe implies that it works without flaws of its own. Functionality means that it simply does its job, but to the standard that is set for it to be a professional commercial grade fryer.

Always Use Quality Oil in Your Professional Deep Fryer

One of the most important things you can do when owning and operating a professional-grade fryer is to provide it with top-shelf oil. You should never buy cheap oil, and you should never overuse your oil. Recycling your oil is only good for so many repetitions.

After so many cycles, it not only becomes stale, but the flammability of the oil increases. Thus, you must be careful not to cook and overuse your oil, as you will be running a huge risk of burning your business down. Using quality oil keeps the risk of a fire down to a minimum, and it also allows the food to always taste perfect day in and out.

Maintain Your Fryers Temperature at All Times

As a fry chef, it is your duty to know how to control and operate the commercial fryer, which is your sole responsibility. With such a weight on your shoulders, it’s especially important that you know to always keep the fryer down to low manageable heat. Whenever you fry anything, the oil tends to fluctuate, so prior to frying something, you will want to raise the temperature so that the food can cook thoroughly and crisp properly without burning or charring.

The more food that goes in the fryer, the lower the temperature will drop, which is why you must significantly raise the temperature so that you can fry at the optimal temperature. As the oil gets hotter and cooler, you will need to maintain a watchful eye to make sure that it doesn’t overheat and boil over or that it doesn’t begin to smoke and catch on fire. Most oils can withstand a certain amount of heat, but with all oils, they must be rotated regularly to prevent fires.

When you’re frying for long periods of time, it is essential that you learn to keep your fryer manageable. This means that you can only cook at certain temperatures while you’re cooking food.

Any other time means that you will have to significantly lower the temperature so that it will stay ready but not hot enough that it will fry. This will increase the longevity of your oil, so it won’t burn or catch fire. It will also allow you to make more food, and the food that you make will taste flavorful and not burned or stale.

Don’t Allow Ice From Frozen Foods in Your Fryer

If you’re every frying with frozen items, you will want to remove as much of the ice as possible. When the ice encounters the hot oil, it can cause the oil to pop and splatter, which could potentially hurt someone. This also means that you must only put in small amounts of food items in the fryer at one time while frozen to prevent overboiling and splattering.

Don’t Turn On Your Fryer Too Early

Whatever you do, do not turn the fryer on too early no matter the situation. Instead, prepare everything else apart from the fried foods.

This is because leaving the oil on too long at a high temperature can cause it to reach its smoking point, which means that it can and will catch fire if it maintains that level of heat for too long. So, to prevent your business from a potential fire hazard, you should only fry whenever menu items are being ordered.

Always remember that oil holds heat, and it will thus retain most of the heat even when it is dialed down to a low temperature. This will help you to regulate your oil temperature while frying and while waiting for the next order.

Those are the basic dos and don’ts of professional deep fryers that every commercial restaurant should maintain. Be sure to always keep a watchful eye whenever you’re frying anything, no matter how large or small of an item or batch of oil it may be.