Kitchen Safety - Home Security Tips

Keeping your home safe includes every room in your home! There are many things that can go wrong when you're in the kitchen. From burns from boiling water, fires, spills or appliance issues, the kitchen can be a dangerous place. In our home security tips series, we're going room by room in your home to provide the most important tips.

1.  Upgrade your appliances

We cannot stress enough the importance of checking your appliance every few months to make sure they are all properly working. Newer smart home products are able to do a number of things designed to make your home safer. New smart fridges are able notify you when the fridge door is open or if it's faulting and even smart ovens are able to be controlled from everywhere.

Worried if you left the oven or any other appliance on? You can always use smart plugs on your appliances so you can control from your phone to make sure all the appliances are off when they are not in use.

2. Install a security camera in your home

Security cameras can be used in a number of ways indoor and outdoor. For your kitchen, it's important to monitor the area specifically if you have kids or pets who like to wander to prevent a situation from happening. Installing a security camera can be a great way to check when a kid or pet is in the kitchen doing something they shouldn't or using a dangerous appliance.

If motion is detected, most cameras like the Toucan Wireless Outdoor Camera will send you notifications to your phone so you can access your live feed to see what is happening when from where ever you are. With two-way audio, you can speak through your phone to anyone in the kitchen remotely as well.

PRO TIP: If you have wireless outdoor cameras that connect to other smart home objects like the Alexa Echo Show and Google Home, you can use these objects to check on your outside security cameras or if someone is at your door while you're cooking for a hands-free experience.

3. Take additional safety precautions.

There is a lot that can go wrong with working on a stove to cook so it's important to make sure you're taking every step you can to keep your home safe.

• Keep all flammables away from the stove (including plastic packaging, wooden utensils, oven mitts, towels etc.)
• Wear tight fitted clothing - loose clothing is more likely to catch fire
• Stay in the kitchen when frying, boiling or broiling. (If you need to step away for any reason, you can check your security cameras to watch and keep a close eye on it). 
• Turn appliances off when not in use - and double check!

4. Set up detectors and keep them on!

Have you ever had the smoke detector go off and wanted the sound to stop so you removed the battery? Been there, done that. But, a lot of the time, people forget to put it back. Make sure any time you cook you check to see if the light is on and working properly. 

There are more smart detector on the market that can help you further protect your home. These smart detectors can send notifications to your phone when something is detected whether you're home or not. If you have your phone on you, you can always know how your home is safe and sound. Smart detectors provide other benefits like providing voice instructions to fix the issue, identifying the exact problem and which detector, and changing colors to hint what the problem is and how much smoke is detected.

5. Take fire precautions

According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), almost 40% of house fires are started by cooking. The most common accidents in the kitchens are burns so it's essential to take extra caution when dealing with the flame.

• If a gas fire occurs, don't use water to put it out.
• Know where your fire extinguisher is
• Keep watch of your children through a security camera when you're out of the room and check when motion is detected through the Toucan Wireless Outdoor Camera