Most of us wear watches at home. Usually, we take our watch off in certain house areas: In the shower, for example. But what about the kitchen? Can you wear a watch in a kitchen?
You can wear a watch in a kitchen, but only at home. This is because the FDA suggests that kitchen staff to not wear any form of jewelry while preparing food. If wearing a watch at your home kitchen, you need to ensure hygiene as a watch can get dirty and pass germs to the food.
Why do you want to wear a watch in the kitchen?
There are actually good reasons why you should wear a watch while preparing food or beverages in your kitchen.
As A Timer
Sometimes when we prepare some food, we need to calculate time.
For example, a simple process of cooking up a bowl of ramen would require you to time the cooking time to two minutes.
If you do not have a watch, you must prepare another timing device. A clock, perhaps. Many of us would just use our phones, which can also be unhygienic in their own way.
But with a watch, just flick up your wrist, read the time, and start the countdown. It is much more efficient than setting up a countdown on your phone or pressing a timer.
Prevents Dirtying Your Food
This might sound contradictory, but please allow us to explain.
If you do not have a watch or a timing device nearby, you will be using a phone to time your food preparation process.
Now take some time to think about this – how many times do we touch our phones every day? And introduce germs to it?
In fact, phones are one of the dirtiest and grossest things we touch every day without realizing it, similar to doorknobs, remote controls, and keyboards.
And the moment after we touch our phone, we go back to touching our food. Think about those germs we just transferred to our food!
So actually, by wearing a watch, you avoid touching your phone and introducing dirty germs to your food and drink.
Prevents Being Distracted By Phone
When preparing food and drinks, you want to concentrate since you can’t really reverse your mistakes. For example, you cant remove excess sugar you added to your cake batter.
And when it comes to distractions, nothing is worse than your phone. Messages, notifications can come anytime and break your concentration.
Plus, phones probably have little use in the kitchen aside from time counting. If you plan to use your phone to watch cooking tutorials or read recipes, you are better off using a laptop or a tablet since they have larger screens.
By keeping your phones away and using a watch for timing, you are more likely to be able to concentrate and prepare better food and drink.
Naked Wrist Just Feels Weird
This can be a legitimate concern to some of us. Some of us are so used to wearing a watch, not wearing it feels weird. Some even feel naked without one.
If you are the kind that feels more comfortable wearing a watch, just keep wearing them in the kitchen. There is nothing wrong with having a personal preference!
What type of watch is suitable to be worn in the kitchen?
However, as much as we want to wear a watch in a kitchen, we also need to consider the FDA’s recommendation.
Its manual says that watches can trap dirt and introduce nasty things into our food and drink. On top of that, your watch may also be exposed to things like water, heat, and sharp objects too.
So this means not all watches are suitable in the kitchen. It might be important to spend some time to think about the kind of watches that suits the kitchen.
Water Resistance
The watch must have water resistance. This is because food and drink preparation often involves contact with water. You will be washing hands and food items frequently as well.
Easy To Clean
The watch must be easy to clean as it will get dirty while you are preparing food in the kitchen. Oil, fluid from raw meat, or flour could quickly get to your watch.
This means your watch needs to be made of waterproof material. The watch also needs to have as few folds or crevices as possible, as these will trap things.
This means leather, cloth, or nylon straps are out. These straps might absorb fluids, and if you catch raw meat fluids on them, they will smell. Metal bracelets are also bad, as things could be trapped between the links.
Rubber or resin-based straps are the best, as they are smooth and waterproof. If they catch any dirty things, you can just scrub the straps down with a dishwasher, and it will be clean again.
The watch case should also be as smooth as possible and waterproof. Most watch cases are smooth and waterproof since they are made of stainless steel and watch crystals, so the key is to make sure there are as few crevices as possible on the watch to avoid trapping things in it.
Can Handle Impacts & Heat
When in the kitchen, your hands will probably be handling sharp objects or be exposed directly to the cold and heat.
You will be putting your hands into the fridge and holding ice or cold meat. Your hands will also be directly on the kitchen stove, your watch will be likely be exposed to steam.
That means your watch needs to be able to handle impact and heat. I
Watches with shock absorption should help in this area. We can’t do too much with heat, but at least you would know not to wear expensive watches in the kitchen.
Not Large & Chunky
Watches in the kitchen should also not be large and chunky. This might interfere with your hands while working in the kitchen.
Large and chunky watches such as divers also tend to be heavy, which might not be comfortable in kitchen.
3 Suitable Watches For Kitchen
From the section above, we know that the best watches for the kitchen need to be small, light, have a smooth surface and be waterproof.
We decided to go to Amazon and try to find watches close to these criteria that might just work for you.
Speidel Scrub 30 Medical Watch
You might find it surprising why a nurse watch is on this list.
If you think about it, watches that nurses wear also need characteristics similar to the kitchen. Waterproof, easy to clean, and has a smooth surface.
In fact, you can use the pulsometer scale on the watch to help you time 15-second intervals better while preparing food.
The watch is 39mm in diameter, running a quartz movement. The watch strap is silicone, waterproof material for easy cleaning. The case and strap is also smooth, with no unnecessary crevices and folds that can trap nasties. 50M water resistance.
Casio MQ24-1B
This watch is small, light, and water-resistant. The watch case and straps are smooth, so they do not trap nasties. The watch is also all black, which means it’s less likely to look dirty.
The straps and case are made of resin, so the watch resists impact better and is waterproof for easy cleaning. The watch is 32mm and runs a quartz movement.
Pyle PATW19BK
This watch made it to the list because it is small and light. The waterproof, soft plastic strap also wraps around the watch case, and you can separate the watch case from the strap for cleaning. The strap surface is also smooth to avoid catching nasties.
The watch also has sport related functions such as pedometer, accelerometer, and backlight.
Wrapping Up: Can You Wear A Watch In A Kitchen?
To summarize, you can wear a watch in the kitchen. However, not all watches are made for the kitchen.
The best watches for the kitchen are small, light, waterproof, and have a smooth surface to avoid trapping food or other nasties. Nurse watches are surprisingly quite suitable for the kitchen.
We hope this article is helpful and that it helped you decide if you can wear a watch in a kitchen or not. Thanks for reading!