Friday, January 22, 2021

3 Easy Safety Tips to Make the Kitchen Safer for Your Family

 Image Courtesy of Pexels

Cooking is something most people love to do and it's great once you get the kids involved. But a kitchen isn’t exactly the safest part of the home and is even more dangerous for children. 

But, there are some things you can do to make family cooking time safer for everybody:

  • Educate the children

  • Install fire safety devices

  • Keep knives out of each

These are common issues that a lot of people often overlook, by educating children about the dangers of a kitchen and things such as knives as well as preventing fire, you can ensure a safer mealtime for everyone. 

If They Don’t Know, They Don’t Know

We hear it all the time, that education is key for most things, and that is especially true when it comes to safety. It's not that people who injure themselves are stupid (well, some are) but more that they might not have been fully informed about the dangers of something.

Hazards are everywhere in a kitchen and not educating the kids about the potential causes and inevitable effects of things like fires from ovens, floods from taps, and personal safety will ultimately contribute to a higher risk of something bad happening. While the insurance public adjuster in town would love your business, I’m sure they would rather see that you were safe.

Simple tricks like teaching the kids to ask if they can enter a kitchen before doing so, making sure they know not to go near the oven, and keeping them from climbing on counters can make a huge difference. Kids aren’t acutely aware of most dangers until they either make a terrible mistake or are informed about them, and it is surprising how well they take advice on board.

Don’t Burn Down the House

This might sound like a no-brainer but installing fire safety devices in a kitchen is essential, even if you use an electric oven and don’t have open flames. Electric ovens can still cause fires, not only from faulty wiring which can cause an electric fire but a stray towel or cloth can be ignited by an electric hob.

Fire extinguishers and fire blankets are excellent choices for fire safety and can be purchased relatively cheap these days. You should take the time to familiarize yourself with the different types of fire though, as using the wrong extinguisher can make a fire worse. 

However, for a kitchen, you would usually require a yellow wet chemical extinguisher designed for putting out fires on soft materials such as paper, wood, and furniture as well as cooking oils and fats. These are known as Class A and Class F hazards respectively.

Installing a smoke alarm will also go a long way in saving your family from potential danger as the NFPA concluded that the mortality rate was twice as high in homes without a fire detector.

They’re not Toys

Anyone who has been around children knows that they just love to grab things, especially things that they see an adult using. In the kitchen, an unattended knife is definitely one of those things, and should it be on a high counter and fall on a child, well, it isn’t good to think about what could happen.

Magnetic knife racks are popular these days but because knives are exposed, and knives can actually fall off of these, it isn’t advised to use them if you have children in the home. A good practice is to make sure knives are put away when not in use; a child protected drawer or secured on an out of reach shelf should do the trick.

To make them even safer, just in case the worst does happen, knife covers are available that can fit almost any knife so that potential accidents don’t turn into horrific injuries. Being constantly aware of the potential dangers of a kitchen is enough to help you make good decisions when it comes to making great meals with your wonderful family.


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