If you want to open your own restaurant, you are sure to face both challenges and rewards as you pursue great tasting meals and profits. You will need more than a few good entrees, however: there are lots of different tools and pieces of equipment you need to get a meal from the oven to the customer’s plate.
Ovens
Unless you intend to open up a restaurant that is entirely cold food, you will likely have to cook the meat, veggies, and carbs at one point or another. A commercial grade oven needs to be able to heat up to at least eight hundred degrees in order to cook food quickly and effectively. An oven that cannot get that hot may leave food improperly heated, and risk customers developing food poisoning or other sicknesses.
Walk In Cooler
The food that you keep on hand has to be kept as cool as possible before it is transferred onto the stove top. Prevent spoiling with a walk in cooler that has a durable latch. Commercial kitchen supply companies offer coolers that are anywhere from fifty square feet to five hundred square feet depending on the size of your operations.
Food Preparation
There are a large number of supplies that you require to make ingredients into a meal. Blenders and juicers will be used for making drinks. Chef knives have to be large, medium, and small, as well as sharp enough to do the trick (self-sharpening knives are a great investment). Food warmers keep the meals hot before they go to tables. Each cook needs their own set of gloves along with aprons and hairnets or hats; most cooking staff use a bandanna to beat the heat.
Office Supply
A restaurant has to be more than a kitchen and a dining room: it needs to keep track of the money coming in and going out if it ever hopes to be profitable. Office supplies like a computer with a spreadsheet and word processing turn a restaurant into a true business, while other supplies like clipboards, filing supplies, cash bags, forms, and safes allow you to handle money or other exchanges like a professional.
Drink Supply
A great deal of the profit of a restaurant comes from the drinks served. Whether it is the ten-cent soft drinks you sell for two dollars or the mixed drinks you sell for ten, there is a lot of profit in drinks. You will need glassware by style in order to provide everything from scotch glasses to water glasses to wine glasses. Coffee cups and fancier glasses (like champagne flutes) are also good to have on hand.
Tableware
On the table itself, the commercial kitchen supply includes blows, flatware, linens, china, and glassware. All of these need to be suitable to be run through a dishwasher several times per night to stay hygienic. Pitchers and plastic tumblers can be used for water, while table top accessories such as napkin holders and salt and pepper shakers make sure the table is ready for visitors.
This article was contributed by Nancy Grace, a mother of 3 and restaurant co-owner.
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