Saturday, February 16, 2013

Maintaining a Commercial Fryer

It doesn’t matter whether you are frying donuts, French fries, or chicken fingers, every commercial fryer needs to be cleaned and maintained regularly. Commercial fryers today can be either gas powered or electric. It is important to know which type you have before you try to clean it. Also, remember that fryers made from stainless steel are always going to be easier to clean and maintain. If you haven’t purchased your commercial fryer yet, I would always recommend going stainless for these machines.
Types of Fryers
User’s Guide to Maintaining a Commercial FryerBefore we talk about cleaning your commercial fryer, let’s talk about the 3 different types of fryers you may have. There are all purpose, pressurized, and specialty fryers. Each is used in a slightly different way. All purpose (the most common) fryers have heating elements underneath and use top loading baskets which get submerged in the oil. Foods placed in all purpose fryers are typically coated in batter to seal in the flavor. A pressurized fryer looks more like a kettle than a traditional fryer. It locks in steam to create pressure cooking. This is a fast cook and requires less heat because of the pressure. The last types of fryers (specialty fryers) are used to cook things like donuts or fish. They have timers for cooking specific items, special racks for holding the food and varied temperature controls to allow for frying a variety of different foods.
Cleaning Your Fryer
The process of cleaning a commercial fryer is pretty straight forward. Follow these directions if you want to clean your fryer properly and quickly:
  1. Drain your fryer daily for the best operation.
  2. Clean up any stickiness in and around your fryer. The fact is that these units have a tendency to build up with grease. Regular checks for these deposits will reduce build up.
  3. Remove crumbs, sediment, or any other crud from the vat of your fryer. As you cook, these things are going to get caught in the vat. This reduces the efficiency of your fryer. Cleaning this area is going to be essential in maintaining a fryer that does the job without sucking a lot of power.
  4. Wash the kettle with hot alkaline solution as required.
  5. Dry your Fryer with a dry cloth, not heat. Heat will cost you more, increase kitchen temperature, and ruin your burner. Drying your unit with a towel once cleaned is a more practical approach.
  6. Clean the element regularly. Like the oil in the vat, the element itself works harder when it is dirty. If it is clean you won’t waste any energy when cooking.
Other Maintenance Tips
When it comes to using your commercial fryer, don’t let it overheat! This is one of the biggest mistakes an owner or operator can make. Read your owner’s manual to find out what your average heating time is and stick to it. If you under heat or over heat your fryer, you will be wasting energy and could cause unnecessary strain on the element. Commercial fryer elements are not cheap to replace so it makes sense to take good care of it from day one.

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