Food safety during summer celebrations

The sum­mer has offi­cially begun. Memo­r­ial Day is behind us and the Fourth of July will be here before we know it. Par­ties, pic­nics, wed­dings, reunions and more will be cel­e­brated with fam­ily and friends.

Whether the food will be made at home or pur­chased from the store, basic food safety must be observed. A party can turn into a dis­as­ter quickly if a food­borne ill­ness shows up, too.

Wash hands, wash hands, wash hands. The major­ity of food­borne ill­ness out­breaks stem from germy fin­gers and uncon­trolled body flu­ids. Sneezes and coughs have a way of trans­fer­ring viruses to peo­ple with and with­out food. Uten­sils and paper prod­ucts usu­ally are not car­ri­ers of sick­ness, but it has happened.

Rub­bing, scrub­bing and thor­ough clean­ing with plenty of fric­tion on your hands is the best way to wash bac­te­ria right down the drain. Dry hands with a single-use paper towel when prepar­ing food for oth­ers, espe­cially if the tem­per­a­ture con­trol is ques­tion­able. Hand san­i­tiz­ers are not sub­sti­tutes for clean hands, but they are bet­ter than noth­ing. Soap and water is the best deterrent.

Trans­fer­ring germs from one food to another is a no-no. Avoid­ing cross con­t­a­m­i­na­tion is a vital process in keep­ing guests healthy. Dur­ing prepa­ra­tion, never mix raw food with already-cooked or ready-to-eat food. Use a clean plate when tak­ing meat off the grill. Keep food safe by using one uten­sil per food item on a serv­ing table. When serv­ing, fin­gers are forbidden.

Hot food needs to be kept above 135 degrees Fahren­heit. Cold food stays safer if below 41 degrees. If menu items are kept at room tem­per­a­ture or above 70 degrees for more than four hours, throw them away. Buy a food ther­mome­ter. Use it. Fol­low the direc­tions to cal­i­brate it.

After every­one eats, store food prop­erly. Leav­ing it out for the flies to land on it is a dis­as­ter wait­ing to hap­pen. When a fly lands on food, it spits its own juices on the food and stomps in the spit­tle until the food is liq­uid and the fly is able to suck it up. While doing that, the fly usu­ally stomps in some extra germs for good mea­sure. When the fly is through eat­ing, then it is your turn to par­take. Sounds yummy, right?

Get the left­over food out of the heat. Unless the tem­per­a­ture is going up to 135 degrees Fahren­heit, most foods will not be safe to eat after being out of the oven or refrig­er­a­tion for 4 hours.

Only serve as much as will be eaten, that way the left­overs are lim­ited. Mak­ing potato salad for a small army is not nec­es­sary for a pic­nic for eight peo­ple. Put foods in smaller con­tain­ers to begin with. This will make serv­ing and cool­ing much easier.

When in doubt; throw it out. Espe­cially do not let lit­tle kids, older folks or those with a dis­ease con­sume ques­tion­able foods. If one of your foods or your food han­dling makes some­one ill, you may not get invited again. Worse yet is that no one will want to come to your parties.

Bob­bie Ran­dall is a cer­ti­fied dia­betes edu­ca­tor, reg­is­tered, licensed dietit­ian. She super­vises a dia­betes self-management train­ing pro­gram at Aultman-Orrville Hos­pi­tal, Orrville. Con­tact her at bobbie.randall@aultmanorrville.org or 330–684-4776.

Posted by Bobbie Randall on May 30 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.