The holiday season is a time for family, friends and feasts. This might mean you end up spending more time than usual in the kitchen, so it’s important to brush up on your Thanksgiving Safety Tips.
Cooking is the main cause of home fires any time of the year but are especially common on Thanksgiving. The average number of home fires in residential buildings on this day is often double the number of these same fires throughout the rest of the year.
Be smart about how you cook this season by following these ten tips:
- Stand by your pan. If you leave your kitchen, turn the burner off. If you find yourself in the kitchen solo, invite a friend in to chat with you or ask for help prepping. This rule doesn’t have to be so lonely!
- Keep an eye on what you fry! Most cooking fires start when frying food. If you’re frying anything, it’s especially important to stand by your pan. Hot grease can get out of control very quick.
- Roll up your sleeves. This reduces the chance that they’ll catch fire. Hopefully your kitchen will be nice and warm and this will just be a part of the day as you’re practicing your Thanksgiving Safety Tips!
- Supervise children and pets. Make sure they stay away from the stove. Kids are great with dishes or setting the table, it’s usually best to give them other jobs if they’re wanting to be helping in the kichen.
- Watch what you’re cooking! If you see any smoke, or grease starts to boil, turn the burner off. We can sometimes wait way too long for this to be a real issue and then it’s too late. At the first time of smoke or boiling grease, turn OFF the stove!
- If there’s an oven fire, keep the door closed. Turn off the oven and keep the door closed until it’s cool. This will be hard in the moment, but a fire without an air source will extinguish faster. Keep the oven door closed and keep fresh air out.
- Move things that can burn away from the stove. This includes dishtowels, bags, boxes, paper and curtains. This is a normal practice to do, don’t wait for Thanksgiving!
- Turn pot handles toward the back of the stove. This is so no one can bump them or pull them over. Often we’re only cooking one thing at at time on the stove and on Thanksgiving, it can get crowded, so this tip is something to be extra aware of when you have a full stove.
- Only use a Thanksgiving turkey fryer outdoors. Make sure that it the fryer is on a sturdy surface, away from things that can burn. As Utah is a dry climate, if you are frying outside, be sure to do it over an inflammable surface like gravel or on the driveway away from vehicles. Do not fry over grasses or leaves. Be sure to learn about winter fire safety prepration too!
- Check smoke alarms. Make sure to have working smoke alarms close to bedrooms and in the kitchen. November is a great time to check your batteries. Set you clock back and check the batteries!
