Acts of Kindness

How to keep a clean kitchen at work

Congratulations, you have a job! While work is, well, work, it can be a pleasant break from the clutter and/or pile of dirty dishes awaiting you at home. But if there’s one thing worse than cleaning up after lazy roommates, it’s cleaning up after fellow colleagues.

Here’s how to keep a clean kitchen at work.

• Clean up after yourself. Don’t leave your dirty dishes in the sink—or worse, at your desk overnight. It’s unfair to everyone else who uses the kitchen, and you wouldn’t like to be stuck with someone else’s unidentifiable lunch remains, would you?
• Now is better than later. Wash your dishes now; don’t leave them for later. Laziness is like the bacterial fungi that may appear on your food, if left alone long enough—it grows over time.
• Rinse dishes before placing them in the dishwasher. It sounds counter-intuitive, but think about it. If a plate is heavy with chunks of food and it sits in the dishwasher, then when that machine turns on, the meat is going to spin and splosh and spray and…you get the picture.
• Clean the refrigerator once a month. Draft up a schedule for fridge clean-up, assigning months to pairs of staff members. There are health consequences, so clean fridge and freezer tips may be useful.
• Want to avoid kitchen politics altogether? Bring in your own dishes, wash them, and then bring them back home. That’s how I do it!

Here’s some inspiration for you—check out the Communal Fridge Blog for images of neglected refrigerators. I hope it doesn’t look familiar! Note: The blog isn’t quite up and running yet, but keep an eye on it!