Home catering business - sink

[Stopactingsosmall]

Hi, I am planning to start a vegan catering business from home. I exchanged a few emails with the council and they said I need a second sink in kitchen for washing hands. If you run a catering business from home, do you have two sinks? Apparently the requirement to have a second sink is recent, since covid. Anyone else running a catering business with one sink in the kitchen? Please tell me how you manage to satisfy the Health and Hygiene regulations? The food I will cook will be low fat, dairy free, gluten free and vegan. See one example of a recent dish I cooked, Mexican black bean stew, just to give you an idea.

I don't know about the sink, I can't imagine there is a workaround, but I imagine it's something to do with gluten free and dairy free and you'll need an entire separate area dedicated to this kind of food prep to avoid contamination. This isn't new, a friend of mine went through the same thing 8 years ago when she wanted to do gluten free and dairy free baking.

I have a small circular stainless steel hand wash basin and then a normal stainless steel sink with draining board in a U-shaped kitchen. 5 star hygiene rating from EH.

Thanks for replying. I have emailed the council and they keep referring me to FDA website . My current sink has two compartments so I thought it may do, although one tap that can be moved to either side. The council said to me that I should just register my business and then they can come and inspect it and advise me further. I don't want to be up and running and then be told I am not complying.

Thanks for replying. Did you get the second handwash basin specifically for your business? A plumber saw my kitchen and said a small handwash basin will disrupt my kitchen as limited space. I can't afford to rent retail shop so running it from home is my only option , plus the flexibility etc.

Don't cook professionally but do catering with a number of charities for events and have always had a second sink available for hand washing, clearly labelled as such - long before COVID. I understood that it was a H & S requirement . . .

It's been a requirement for many years to have a separate sink for handwashing. Could you get a sink fitted but with a cover that sits on at worktop height? So doesn't disrupt the workspace. You could wash hands, replace cover and then you've got the space.

Thanks for your suggestion. I will look into it.