The holidays are upon us, and with them comes holiday cooking — a delightful perk of the season that millions enjoy around the world. However, along with the delicious aromas there is another side to holiday cooking: safety. Holiday cooking is a leading cause of fires in winter months. Luckily, there are things you can do to help manage that risk. Read on for a collection of handy holiday cooking safety tips to help keep your family and home safe this holiday season!

Keep Chaos Out of the Kitchen

Ensure that all non-food related activities happen outside the kitchen. Fewer people in the kitchen means fewer chances for a kitchen fire during holiday cooking.

Make sure there is enough room in your kitchen to cook comfortably and safely. A certain amount of chaos is inevitable during the holidays, but you can minimize the potential risks by insisting on some things. For one thing, make sure that everyone stays out of the kitchen unless they’re actively working on something related to cooking (and then get them out of their when they’re finished). Instead, ask guests to entertain themselves outside of the kitchen while everything is cooking. This will give you more room to move around and do what you need to do without constantly bumping into people who just want to hang out and offer suggestions.

Never Leave the Stove Unattended

One of the most important things you can do to keep your holiday cooking safe is to never leave a pot unattended on the stove. When you’re cooking, it’s so easy to get distracted by all the amazing smells coming from your kitchen. But it only takes a few seconds for something to get out of hand—and if you’re not in the room, you won’t be able to see it or stop it before disaster strikes. If you must leave, turn the burner off and be sure the handle is turned inward where it will not be bumped. Better yet, ask someone else to answer the doorbell or take the dog for a walk.

Follow the Recipe

When you’re trying to get a delicious meal on the table, it can be tempting to skip steps and improvise. But when it comes to cooking safety, you really need to follow the recipe – especially if the recipe calls for a certain type of pan.

While using an undersized pan might seem like a good idea, it could actually cause issues with your dish boiling over, which can cause a fire hazard. And if you use too large of a pan for your ingredients, it could result in them burning on the bottom of the pan or in the oven. So when it comes to cooking safety this holiday season, don’t be tempted by shortcuts!

Baking cookies shouldn’t scare you! Just look how delicious they are!

Dress For Safety

When you’re in the kitchen, how you dress can be critical. If your clothing is loose or long-sleeved, it could catch fire when you least expect it, causing severe burns and spreading the fire to the rest of the kitchen.

It’s also important that you tie back long hair. Long hair can get caught in machinery and cause injuries if you aren’t careful.

Keep Children Away from Cooking Area

When you’ve got a turkey roasting away in the oven, it’s hard not to be distracted. But even with your back turned for a moment, small children can get into trouble. A child’s curiosity is boundless, and it’s just as easy for them to wander into the kitchen and start playing with the turkey baster or zesting oranges for the stuffing as it is for them to grab a toy from the other room and be caught up in play before you know it. It’s important that you keep an eye on your kids this holiday season and make sure they stay out of harm’s way at all times. When you are working in the kitchen, keep kids nearby but out of the cooking area. If you need to occupy your little one while you prepare dinner, set them up with some arts and crafts projects or a new book—your local library likely has some holiday-themed selections geared toward young kids. If they’re old enough to help out in the kitchen, assign specific tasks like setting the table or wiping down spills.

You want to avoid having kids underfoot when you’re cooking because even if they never come into contact with the hot stove or any sharp implements, there are plenty of other things that can go wrong that could result in injury.

Be Ready to Put Out a Cooking Fire

The most effective way to put out a cooking fire is to smother it. Keep a tight-fitting lid and potholder within reach any time you use the stove so you can smother any flames that ignite inside a frying pan or saucepan. Keep a working fire extinguisher handy for fires that start outside a cooking vessel. Remember to aim the extinguisher at the base of the flame, not at the flames themselves.

If you cannot get a cooking fire under control quickly, evacuate the house and call 911. Afterwards, contact a local fire damage restoration company to assist with the damage cleanup.

Keep these Christmas safety tips in mind during your holiday cooking, and you’ll be able to focus on enjoying time with friends and family, not on getting everyone safely out of the house during a fire.

About Vince Sandri

Vince Sandri is a content writer and blogger with more than 12 years of experience. His expertise is in creating content related to disaster restoration, including information about preventing and reacting to natural disasters like flooding, water damage, fire and smoke damage, mold growth, storm damage and more.
Vince has been the main contributor to RestorationMasterFinder.com since 2014. Over that time, he has written numerous service pages and blogs for disaster restoration providers featured on RestorationMasterFinder.com. Vince has done extensive research and covered a wide range of topics relating to disaster restoration to help homeowners, business owners, and property managers better protect their property. He understands the problems that disasters like flooding, fire, smoke, and mold can cause as well as the best ways to respond to these issues to limit the damage.
Vince completed his Bachelor of Arts degree at Aurora University and his master’s degree at DePaul University. He has been writing SEO website pages, blogs, and press releases since 2012. Vince is also a musician and can be seen playing in the Chicago, IL area.