Hygiene & porcelain
Before we come to the actual content of this page - the interaction of hygiene and porcelain - it is important for us to explain the prerequisites and general conditions to underline the importance of porcelain in commercial catering.
Definition Hygiene
Hygiene or health care is "the conscious avoidance of all dangers threatening health and the performance of health-promoting actions. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), hygiene refers to all conditions and actions that serve to prevent the spread of disease and maintain health.
Medical hygiene includes many specific applications that help maintain health, such as keeping the environment clean, sterilizing equipment, hand hygiene, water and sanitation, and safe disposal of medical waste. Hygiene in the broader sense is the "totality of all efforts and measures to prevent diseases and damage to health. In this sense, hygiene also includes aspects of air hygiene, water hygiene or drinking water hygiene, food hygiene, industrial hygiene, construction hygiene, residential hygiene and religious regulations.
Food Hygiene
Food safety and food hygiene are generic terms for all measures and concepts that are intended to ensure that food is suitable for consumption by the end consumer and that no health impairments or damage can arise from it.
The Basic Food Regulation established the first general principles of food law and food safety at European level and established the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). With a large number of other regulations ranging from hygiene to declaration, the regulations and methods for food safety are becoming increasingly unified and harmonized. An overview of the structures and institutions of food safety in the European Union (EU) and neighboring countries is provided by the EU Food Safety Almanac, which was compiled by the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR).
Hygiene and gastronomy
Information for prospective restaurateurs about industry-relevant regulations and hygiene rules is required by law. The IHK certificate of attendance of the instruction is a prerequisite for obtaining the restaurant concession - the so-called Frikadellenschein - from the public order office. The instruction is intended to convey the basic principles of the food law knowledge necessary for the envisaged operation. It extends to the relevant basic principles of hygiene regulations including the Infection Protection Act, the Foodstuffs Act and the regulations based on it, the Meat Inspection Act and the regulations based on it, the milk law, the beverage law (in particular the wine law and the beer law) and the law on beverage dispensing systems. Reference should also be made to the relevant guidelines of the German Foodstuffs Book.
Hygiene and Porcelain
Bacteria, fungi, yeasts, germs and viruses, microbiological contaminants and biochemical reactions caused by spoilage are the everyday enemies with which the human immune system has to deal. To describe the multitude of them here would exceed the scope and our competence.
These earthly contemporaries, however, all have one thing in common: They are spreading! Depending on their environment (room, temperature, humidity, light intensity and pressure) they spread at different speeds and intensities. Every lettuce leaf, every potato, every egg and every piece of meat carries bacteria. All objects that come into contact with it can absorb them or pass on already stored germs. Door handles, storage boxes, chopping boards, light switches or stair railings are as much bacteria slingshots as the serving and the passage to the scullery.
In this giant wheel of the gastronomic interplay between people, food and objects, a material stands out that is characterized by its lowest degree of contamination and its mechanical resistance: Porcelain. The German consumer advice center compliments porcelain (and glass) on its "zero migration" of germs and bacteria.
Even we at Holst Porzellan may doubt whether it is really a "zero migration". But we do emphasize that porcelain is the material with the lowest degree of germination used in the kitchen. Experts describe the effect of porcelain as anti-bacterial / antimicrobial or growth-inhibiting. Furthermore, porcelain is a hypoallergenic material. This means a substance that is not or only slightly allergenic.
No other material can guarantee this hygienic property, which is so important for commercial catering, with all the other advantages of unlimited durability, insensitivity to chemical corrosion and an attractive presentation for the guest. Neither ceramics nor stoneware, New Bone China or other imaginative materials keep what porcelain promises!
Please read the section "Buy & Use - Contamination" for information on the sources of contamination and microbial contamination.