Food Safety Tips for Memorial Day Weekend

Picnics, barbecues, family, friends and the traditional start of summer… Who doesn’t love Memorial Day weekend? While you’re assembling your list of activities for the busy holiday weekend, you may want to remember to add some standard food safety precautions to the agenda. With the warmer weather, the buffet style feeding frenzy, and the potluck smorgasbords that you’re about to partake in, your risk for a foodborne illness is likely to increase significantly. And, I didn’t even mention the lack of hand washing facilities, in some instances… step away from my food!

·       • Wash your hands thoroughly with soap and warm water (100⁰F) before handling any food and after handling raw meat, poultry, or raw eggs.

·        • Always rinse fresh fruits and vegetables.

·       • Cook foods to the required temperatures, especially ground beef (155⁰F), pork (145⁰F), and poultry (165⁰F).

·       • Keep hot foods hot (above 135⁰F) and cold foods cold (below 41⁰F).

Avoid cross contamination, don’t let raw meat products come into contact with ready-to-eat foods (i.e. lettuce, tomato, onions, cheese, bread). Don’t use the same plates and utensils for raw and cooked meat products; for example, don’t carry meat to the grill on a plate and then place the cooked burgers on that same plate without first properly washing it. Someone could get E.coli or Salmonella as a result of this cross-contamination and spend hours lying on the bathroom floor… or worse.

Many picnic foods are potentially hazardous, and should be handled with care:

·       • Any product that contains eggs, meat, poultry, tuna, potatoes, pasta, etc.

·       • Lunchmeats, protein foods, ham salad, chicken salad, tuna salad, etc.

·       • Meat, fish, poultry

·       • Milk and dairy

·       • Sliced tomatoes

·       • Cut melons – yes, melons!

Again, KEEP HOT FOODS HOT (above 135⁰F) and KEEP COLD FOODS COLD (below 41⁰F)! Enjoy your time with your family and friends, and keep everyone safe and healthy!

*Temperatures in article are reflective of the 2013 FDA FOOD CODE

So, What is Gluten?

Some people cannot eat gluten for medical reasons, but many people don’t eat it because they think it will make them gain weight, some fitness instructor told them not to or because everyone is talking about it. Ten years ago no one in the food industry was talking about it. Recently, Jimmy Kimmel did a segment asking “gluten-free” people at a popular exercise spot one simple question:

What is gluten? Sadly, not one person got it right. They had no idea what gluten is or why they should or should not be eating it. The truth is, unless there is a medical reason, you shouldn’t eliminate entire food groups from your diet. By definition:

Gluten: A substance present (protein) in grains – wheat, barley, rye, spelt, triticale, some oats and several other grains. It causes illness in people with Celiac Disease and gluten allergies.
There are major problems with the gluten-free movement, including a lack of education. For those with legitimate problems that go on a gluten-free diet, how it improves their health is life changing. They share the good news with friends and family - inadvertently giving them false hope that it will make them feel better too. Going gluten-free will not help you lose weight and will not make you feel better if your body is able to digest it. It isn’t uncommon to see someone that is on a “gluten-free diet” at the bar enjoying a beer – because they have no idea what gluten is. It’s difficult to find beer is that is not direct derivative of gluten!

On the flip side, the gluten-free fad has created a stigma in the food industry. When someone with a real illness or allergy comes into a restaurant, some servers don’t take it seriously when they mention gluten-free. They think it is a fad or the person is over dramatizing their situation. This is a huge problem because it IS serious. That person could be sick for days or weeks from minimal exposure to gluten (only 20 ppm* is enough to cause illness); and, the levels of illness can vary greatly from person to person.

Servers don’t understand that picking the croutons off the top of the salad isn’t enough. They don’t understand gluten-free pasta cannot be cooked in the same pot that was just used for regular pasta. This is why education is imperative! Don’t put your establishment in a libelous situation where someone could become very ill or die because your staff doesn’t understand the seriousness of celiac disease and food allergies. If your team isn’t properly trained, you could be held legally responsible if an incident occurs.

FSTS can help! Visit us at fsts.net/allergytraining to find a course designed for you.

*20 parts per million, comparable to one drop of food coloring in a gallon of water.

1 in 6 American’s Get Food Poisoning Annually, Don’t Become a Statistic!

Francine L. Shaw CP-FS, CFSM, FSP, FMP

Food Safety Solutions, INC  |  3.2.2015

Every year in this country 48 million people get foodborne illnesses, 128,000 individuals are hospitalized and 3,000 people die. US Foodborne illnesses cost 15.6 billion dollars per year…that’s right, BILLION. Yet, they’re 100% preventable. So why and how does this happen?

In most occurrences it’s really pretty basic. Here are the statistics: improper holding temperatures (37%), poor personal hygiene (19%), cross contamination (16%), improperly cleaning and sanitizing the dishes and utensils (11%), purchasing products from unapproved suppliers (6%). In many cases it is never determined where the foodborne illness originated. Of those that have been determined: 61% ate food prepared by foodservice, 32% ate food prepared at home, and 7% ate food that was commercially prepared i.e. tuna salad, potato salad, etc.

So how do you know the food you are serving is safe? If you are being proactive you really should have little doubt; but, so many are flying by the seat of their pants. Does your facility have a HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) plan in place? Do you panic when the health inspector walks in the door? Are you embarrassed by the results of your most recent inspection? Do you have at least one food manager on staff? The FDA FOOD CODE recommends you do, some states and jurisdictions mandate it while others do not. A savvy restaurant owner would educate their staff either way. To protect their customers, increase their bottom line and help minimize their liability. Take your blinders off and look around your facility, does it look clean? Not just on the surface, but the details. The threshold under the door where your customers enter, the ceiling vents, the baseboards, is there mold in the ice chute at the beverage bar?

Now is the time to get back to the basics. Keep HOT food HOT and COLD food COLD.  Hot food should be held at a minimum of 135⁰F (57⁰C) and cold food should be held at a maximum of 41⁰F (5⁰C).  Time and temperature play an important role in food safety.  It’s paramount that food products are cooked to the correct temperature and stored properly. How do you know this if you can’t even find the thermometer; or, don’t have one? And, this is just the beginning!

Are the employee’s washing their hands with soap? Are they wearing gloves when necessary? Are their uniforms clean? This is all part of personal hygiene….someone that is preparing food should never wear their apron into the restroom because….Well, I won’t get into that here.

Education is power. Educate yourself and your team; don’t allow yourself or your establishment to become one of the statistics in Bill Marler’s phenomenal food poisoning litigation practice.

Handwashing with soap stops the spread of disease and can save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention.

Please download the free handwashing PDF.

Monitor Food Safety While Staying Heart Healthy

PURCHASING

Be selective.

Do not purchase bruised or damaged produce - whether it’s on sale or not!

If purchasing pre-cut produce — such as a sliced cantaloupe or bagged salad greens — choose only those items that are kept cold i.e. refrigerated, packed in ice.

Fresh fruits and vegetables must be bagged separately from meat, poultry and seafood products when packing them to take home. This is a sure way to cause illness. Cross-contamination is bound to happen if these items are bagged together.

STORAGE

Did you know that proper storage could affect quality and safety?

Store fresh fruits and vegetables (like strawberries, lettuce, herbs, and mushrooms) in a clean refrigerator at a temperature of 41°F (5°C) or below. There shouldn’t be any mold or unidentifiable objects in your refrigerator. These things are spreading contamination, get rid of them!

All produce that is purchased pre-cut or peeled must be refrigerated to maintain both quality and safety.

SEPARATE

Fruits and vegetables that will be eaten raw must be kept separate from other foods such as raw meat, poultry or seafood — and from kitchen utensils used for those products. If not cross-contamination is likely to occur. Here are a few food safety precautions:

Wash cutting boards, dishes, utensils and counter tops with soap and hot water between the preparation of raw meat, poultry and seafood products and the preparation of produce that will not be cooked.

If you use plastic or other non-porous cutting boards, run them through the dishwasher after use.

PREPARATION

When preparing fresh produce, start with clean hands. Wash your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and warm water 100°F (38°C) before and after preparation.

Remove any and all damaged or bruised areas on fresh fruits and vegetables before preparing and/or eating. Produce that looks spoiled must be discarded.

Wash all produce thoroughly under running water before eating, cutting or cooking. This includes produce grown conventionally or organically at home, or purchased from a grocery store or farmer’s market. Using soap, detergent or commercial produce washes is not recommended.

Whether or  not you plan to peel the produce before consuming, it is still important to wash it first so dirt and bacteria aren’t transferred from the utensil onto the food product. Melons and cucumbers and other firm veggies should be scrubbed with a clean produce brush.

Dry product with a clean paper towel to remove any remaining bacteria that may be present.

Of course eating fruits and vegetables is not the only thing that will help you maintain a healthy heart. A well balanced diet and exercise are part of the plan as well. And, I would be totally remiss if I didn’t mention that while a happy healthy heart is our number one goal - if you are lying on the floor beside the toilet and it’s because your forgot to wash your veggies; your happy healthy heart is going to feel very, very sad. 

We at Food Safety Training Solutions, Inc. wish you a lifetime of love with a healthy heart.

Celebrity Chefs: Have they forgotten basic hygiene?

During the past eight years, I have trained nearly 10,000 people for food manager certifications nationally and internationally.

On a weekly basis, someone brings up a celebrity chef and talks about what he or she viewed on a televised program. Bam! I have to undo the damage that’s been done.

In other words, if a huge celebrity chef can do it on TV, why can’t I?

Let me tell you, Gordon Ramsay’s primary responsibility when filming “Hell’s Kitchen” isn’t food safety, it’s entertainment. The same rubrics apply for Tom Colicchio and the filming of “Top Chef.”

Then we move to morning television. Flashback to November 2012 and Martha Stewart, self-proclaimed queen of anything and everything domestic, was confined to bed for several days after becoming ill with salmonella. She had made her rounds on the daytime talk shows, preparing turkeys for the Thanksgiving holiday. I remember thinking, “I wish they would show her wearing gloves or washing her hands.” Apparently, she did neither, or at least not well.

Yes, celebrities get sick, too.

In December, Giada De Laurentiis was on “The Today Show” preparing ready-to-eat foods with her bare hands. But worse than that, she had a bandage on her finger.

Where was the finger cot? Where were the single-use disposable gloves?

This will certainly send any health inspector or food safety professional over the proverbial edge. Is there any responsibility as far as the media is concerned, or is it simply entertainment?

If I was inspecting a kitchen she was working in and this was happening, it certainly would be a violation. Foodborne illnesses such as Staphulococcus aureus, Hepatitis A and Norovirus can spread rapidly via improper personal hygiene such as not properly washing one’s hands or washing improperly. Wearing single-use gloves is an added precaution to prevent the spread of illness.

An unbandaged, uncovered wound just adds insult to injury.

The fact is, often the food you see celebrity chefs preparing isn’t what the audiences are consuming, but viewers assume it is. In reality, the food is prepared in a professional kitchen that you don’t see on the air.

Here are six food-safety tips for any kitchen, whether it belongs to a home chef or a celebrity chef:

1. Wash your hands. Always wash your hands with hot, soapy water for at least 20 seconds before and after handling food. Dry with a paper towel.

2. Two-hour rule. Refrigerate or freeze perishables, prepared food and leftovers within two hours. Do not leave them sitting out at room temperature. Bacteria grows rapidly at room temperature.

3. Thaw laws. Always thaw food in the refrigerator. Never defrost food at room temperature on the counter top or in the sink. It is acceptable to thaw frozen food under running water at a temperature of 70 degrees or below.

4. Cutting-edge guidelines. Wash cutting boards and knives with hot, soapy water after food preparation, especially after cutting raw meat, poultry or seafood. Clean utensils and cutting boards between uses when meat has been on them. Sanitize cutting boards and counters with a diluted bleach solution. Add 1 Tablespoon bleach to a gallon of water; put in a spray bottle for easy use.

5. The raw deal. Never place food on the same plate or cutting board that previously held raw meat, poultry or seafood unless the cutting board has been thoroughly washed and rinsed.

6. Mindful marinating. Always marinate food in the refrigerator, not on the countertop. Discard leftover marinades that have been used with raw meat, poultry or seafood.

I am not familiar with any celebrity chefs who are ranking food-safety trailblazers. Let’s let the food-safety professionals execute the educating and the chefs prepare the meals. As for the celebrity chefs — let’s hope they remember some of the basics they were taught when they began in the industry and hope the restaurants they own utilize better food-safety techniques than the television shows for which they’re famous.

NOROVIRUS - YOU DON'T WANT IT!

Francine L. Shaw CP-FS.CFSM.FSP.FMP

When you go to the restroom do you wash your hands? I bet you silently responded, "YES!" Do you use soap? Again, "YES?!" Statistically speaking, it's not the case. "What?!" you say. That's right. One in three people that use the restroom don't wash their hands afterwards. EEEWWW....Then they touch the doorknob to open the door and leave the restroom. You know what that means....Yep, you may as well have not washed your hands either. Everything that was on their grimy little paws is now on your nice clean hands! PIGS, I say...PIGS! And, that's why you are now home in bed with norovirus....

Norovirus is the leading cause of gastrointestinal illness in both the USA and the UK. It is a miserable illness and misery loves company. To say one is miserable when they have this foodborne illness is putting it mildly. It's misery incarnate. One minute you're absolutely fine, and the next you think you're going to die - or that death would be preferable.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that each year noroviruses cause an estimated 21 million illnesses and 800 deaths. Approximately 80 percent of the infections occur between November and April, when people tend to gather in enclosed spaces with little fresh air circulating.

Nausea, 'projectile vomiting', and 'explosive' diarrhea are the usual symptoms - sometimes simultaneously; then stomach cramps, muscle aches, low-grade fever, headache, and fatigue, that can go on for days after the main symptoms dissipate. Even though norovirus typically lasts one to three days, an infection can be hazardous, especially for small children, elderly, and people with compromised immune systems. The greatest risk is dehydration stemming from the constant vomiting and watery diarrhea.

The virus spreads quickly in close confined quarters such as day care centers, schools, office buildings, retirement centers, hotels, and nursing homes, as well as on cruise ships. Most cruise ships try hard to prevent outbreaks, but norovirus is quite tenacious and often persists through their efforts. Most hand sanitizers don't kill the bug!

Frequent hand washing with soap and hot water - 100 degrees Fahrenheit - for at least 30 seconds, especially after using the toilet, is the best preemptive. Failing to wash your hands after using the restroom risks transference of the virus to foods, drinks, or utensils used by others - and let's not forget the doorknob you touched on the way out of the restroom! It only takes a small inoculation of norovirus to cause the illness and trust me....YOU DON'T WANT IT!

WASH YOUR HANDS! WASH YOUR HANDS! WASH YOUR FREAKIN HANDS!

WHAT? ALTER NANNY’S RECIPE?!

I love the holiday season.  From Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day...food, food, food and more food!  And, I LOVE food…meat, vegetables, fruit, cookies, desserts and don’t forget the drinks! One of my favorites, EGGNOG (spiked eggnog)…

Nanny’s Eggnog recipe most likely needs a Safety Update (and, before you say it – NO alcohol does NOT kill the bacteria). I love my Nanny’s eggnog, what do I do?! Pasteurized shelled eggs are an option, if you have access to them.  If not you’ll need to go another route.

The key is to heat the eggs to 160°F in order to kill the bacteria.

Ahhhh, but the savvy egg-eater would say that this would make a runny egg an omelet; and, they would be right.  However, simple alterations to the recipe can fix this problem. Eggs harden when their proteins coagulate, so in order for them to stay runny, their proteins must remain separate. This can be achieved by diluting the egg with something like milk or sugar.

The magic number is two tablespoons of sugar per white.  If yolks and whites are being cooked together the American Egg board recommends ¼ cup of liquid or sugar per egg. This mixture can then be heated to 160°F and it will not harden. 

Following this recommendation will not only keep your eggnog safe, but you can refer to it for other recipes containing raw eggs as well. No need to change the recipes, just combine the ingredients in a different order.

Now, let’s talk about another source of Salmonella.  As I mentioned before I LOVE food, anything sweet is my weakness (my dentist is cringing right now).

Eggs are the boring ingredient that goes into many of these cookies, cakes, and other sweet treats. Eggs are often added quickly then we move on to something more exciting…Chocolate chips! 

When you purchase your eggs commercially there are regulations in place, so you can expect the exterior of the egg and the carton to have met certain standards. However, Salmonella can live inside the shell. This means you need to be careful.

I’m not going to tell you to not eat raw cookie dough or you will never read anything else I write.  What I am going to say is, do it at your own risk. None of you want to spend the holiday snuggled up to the toilet on the bathroom floor.  Barf Humbug! 

Enjoy the season and everything it has to offer – SAFELY!