Canteen/Break Room

What hygiene and food safety control is required for the canteen/breakroom?  We have a break room that serves food at break and is also the laundry area.  We also store our clean smocks, aprons, and clean towels in same area.

There should be separation between your breakroom and your laundry/smock area. There is significant risk of allergens from employee lunches contaminating clean smocks, not to mention the general debris/sanitation issues that come with an eating area. I would recommend separating these settings, it would be hard to justify having them in the same area without some intense (ie annoying for employees) control.

In general, breakrooms should be cleaned daily at least, and handwashing facilities should be available so employees can wash hands before returning to work. Be mindful of how long employee meals are being left in the fridge (weekly cleanouts)? Cleaned smocks need to be stored in a way that keeps them clean while they await use.

What food safety controls - dI' start with separating funtions completely - cross contamination is a real bitch in this kind of situation - Separation in this case means walls up, separate areas.

We don't have much room, so we keep the smocks on a rack that is covered with a plastic cover that can be unzipped to get the smocks out.  

gee, you kinda didn't mention the plastic thing on your first missive - should I assume everything is covered in plastic that is laundry related and you log everytime someone pops those open and closes them???

The logging is one thing we dant do.  That could be very time consuming .  I am definitely going to have to implement some form of monitoring for this

Storing smocks in my breakroom would be a hard pass, they're not allowed in my breakrooms at all.  Once you allow them to dress in there, there's nothing stopping them from grabbing one last bite of a milk chocolate peanut bar at the end of their break.  I've had plants store them just inside or just outside the production area in some good cabinets, section off one area with fencing or curtains to designate it the dressing area prior to or immediately upon entry.