5 easy ways to keep your kitchen air clean and healthy

Ensuring good quality air inside your home is important for protecting your family’s health. It may surprise you to know air pollution is all around us – even inside our own homes. In fact, without the right setup, cooking can be a major source of indoor air pollution, which is alarming considering how much time we spend in our kitchens. There’s no need to panic though, as we’ve put together these 5 top tips to help keep your kitchen air clean and healthy.

1. Good Ventilation Helps Improve Air Quality

Breathing clean air should be a priority. Installing a good quality rangehood (also known as an extractor fan or exhaust hood) over your cooktop is therefore essential, particularly if you’re cooking with gas. Rangehoods are designed to remove heat, grease, odours, smoke and other pollutants that are released into the air while cooking, helping to improve the air quality of your kitchen.

Deciding on a rangehood will often depend on how your kitchen is set up, however it should be noted that high efficiency rangehoods which are vented from the outside are considered the most effective choice when it comes to reducing unwanted fumes. For top of the line technology, products such as the Schweigen 120cm Silent Ceiling Cassette Rangehood will have you covered with its intense extraction capacity and multiple LED lights to illuminate brightly over your creations. Or for a more cost-effective option, consider this stylish 90cm black Chef Canopy Rangehood, which ensures fumes are swiftly removed during the most intense cooking sessions.

The Good Guys have a huge range of styles and types of rangehoods to choose from, including canopy, fixed, slideout, undermount and island models. Click here to see our rangehood buying guide to help make a more informed choice for your needs.

Remember, it is not just important to have a rangehood, but to use it whenever you are cooking in the kitchen. Simple measures like opening windows during and after cooking will also help improve natural air flow in your house. A good tip is to open windows on opposite sides of the kitchen to help remove pollutants more quickly.

2. Consider a Cooktop Upgrade

If your cooktop has seen better days, it may be time to consider replacing it with a newer model. While you don’t always need the latest and greatest in kitchen appliances, keeping your kitchen safer and healthier can be easy with some of the more recent cooking technologies, such as induction.

Induction cooktops produce an electro-magnetic field when the cookware touches the surface. The base of the cookware becomes the heating element, rather than the cooktop itself, which allows for lots of power and fast, high temperatures (no more waiting for that water to boil!). In addition to the exceptional heating speed, temperature control and energy efficiency, one of the biggest advantages of having an induction cooktop is the enhanced safety. Induction cooking doesn’t emit gas into the air, which helps reduce the level of pollutants in your kitchen. The cooktop itself also remains cool to touch, making it safer to use around children and pets.

Bosch has a great range of induction cooktops on the market, including this 90cm stainless steel model with 5 cooking zones and features like Power Boost to cover all your cooking needs. Don’t think you can afford induction? Think again! Chef’s 90cm Induction Cooktop is a fast, energy efficient cooking solution with timeless black glass design for seamless integration into any cooking space.

To find out more about which cooktop is right for you read here

“While you don’t always need the latest and greatest in kitchen appliances, keeping your kitchen safer and healthier can be easy with some of the more recent cooking technologies.”

3. Professional Installation

Installing appliances like a cooktop or rangehood can be tricky. Whether you’re replacing an old, inefficient model or putting in a new one for your dream kitchen renovation, we recommend getting a professional to take care of it for you. An experienced installer will be in and out of the kitchen in a fraction of the time it could take a home DIYer. You will avoid incorrect placement issues, which can be difficult and expensive to fix, and it will also ensure your warranty remains valid if anything goes wrong. More importantly, if you choose the right appliance for your needs and have it professionally installed, it will do the job it's designed to do and give you years of quality service.

4. Regular Cleaning

Your kitchen is often the busiest, and sometimes the dirtiest, part of the house. To help improve indoor air quality you should start by keeping it as clean as possible with regular cleaning practices. Here are a few key things to remember:

• Moisture can cause mould build-up, which is a big cause of indoor air pollution, so keeping everything dry is super important. Fix any leaks, wipe the sink and counters with clean dry cloths and clean food spills immediately.

• Use reliable all-purpose cleaners for your kitchen to reduce the amount of germs and bacteria traveling in the air. If you have the option, choose natural cleaning products with less chemicals as these can contaminate the air too.

• Try to empty the bins as regularly as possible.

• Don’t forget to give your hard-working appliances a thorough clean - you can’t expect your rangehood to be working at its full capacity if it’s clogged with grease! Be sure to remove the fan filters and soak them in hot water with soap or a degreasing agent and rinse thoroughly.

5. Annual Service

Kitchen appliances are not only expensive investments, but they’re also the ones that can cause the greatest inconvenience when they stop working. The good news is, investing in an annual service can ensure they operate more efficiently, last longer and may even cut down on energy expenses too.

Following these 5 easy tips will help you rest easy knowing you’re doing everything you can to keep your family safe and healthy in the heart of your home. For further product information and demonstrations, or to find out more about how you can help keep your air clean in all areas of the home, head in store to speak to one of our friendly experts.