ESSENTIAL KITCHEN BEST PRACTICES FOR EVERY HOME

While being a super cook is a plus, kitchen safety and safe food is a priority. It is extremely important to handle food with care and caution because it doesn’t take much to spread germs or make people sick. There are many pieces of equipment and environmental hazards that can be extremely dangerous. Sharp objects like knives, open fire by the oven, electrical appliances, and even bacteria around the kitchen can become hazardous if not put in check.  Observing basic rules of kitchen safety is a good habit to develop. Fortunately, you don’t have to reach perfection to have a safe kitchen and home, and the changes you should make are simple.

Here are essential kitchen best practices for every home you should follow to ensure kitchen safety and save food:

1. Wash your hands the right way

Wash your hands before handling food and after handling meat or poultry. Hands can be a virtual freight train of bacteria.

• STEP 1: WET your hands with clean, warm water.
• STEP 2: SOAP up your hands.
• STEP 3: RUB your hands vigorously for 20 seconds. Be sure to wash all surfaces including palms/fingers, back of hands, wrists, between fingers/thumbs, and under/around fingernails.
• STEP 4: RINSE thoroughly, rubbing all surfaces to remove all soap.
• STEP 5: DRY your hands rubbing vigorously with paper towel or clean cloth towel.

2. Rely on a food thermometer rather than visual cues to determine doneness

Always use a food thermometer to ensure that meat and poultry are thoroughly cooked to the proper internal temperature as follows:

• Whole or ground poultry:         74°C
• Ground meats (other than poultry): 72°C    
• Fresh fin fish: 63°C
• Whole Cuts of Meat (including pork): 63°C
• Seafood: 63°C
• Leftovers: 74°C
• Fresh pork, beef, veal: 63°C with a three-minute rest time

i. Rest time refers to the time the meat needs to stand without carving or consuming once it has reached a minimum safe cooking temperature. During the three minutes after meat is removed from the heat source and allowed to stand, its temperature remains constant or continues to rise, which helps destroy harmful bacteria.

ii. Don’t rely on sight to gauge if meat or poultry is cooked to the proper temperature, as meats can change color before reaching a temperature sufficient to kill bacteria.

iii. For breads, cookies, tortillas, pizza, biscuits, pastries, and pancakes, follow the recipe or package directions for proper cooking/baking time and temperature.

iv. For crafts such as ornaments and play dough, remember that flour is a raw agricultural product and hasn’t been treated to kill germs like E. coli. Do not let children play with or eat raw dough or batter. The bacteria are killed when the dough or batter is cooked.

v. Remember, contaminated food CANNOT be effectively detected by smell, color, or taste of your food. A food thermometer is a critical tool that’ll help make certain potentially dangerous bacteria in your food have been destroyed. Between readings, be sure to wash your food thermometer.

3. Defrost in cold environments

Many kitchen best practices come back to the food temperature danger zone, including thawing. Defrost frozen items by placing them in the refrigerator, thawing them in the microwave or submerging them in cold water. Never let food sit on the counter top to thaw. If you need to defrost food, don’t place it on the counter to thaw at room temperature. Instead, use one of the following methods:

• Place covered food in a shallow pan or on a plate on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator until thawed.
• Use a microwave to defrost. If using this method, you must finish cooking the food immediately after thawing as the cooking process has already started.

4. Wash Produce Properly

Knowing when and how to wash produce properly is an important best practice that will help you prevent food-borne illness. Here are a few rules to follow:

Produce that’s pre-packaged or doesn’t indicate it’s been pre-washed should be washed before eating.

• Only wash produce right before you eat it since, once it’s wet, the surfaces become a moist environment where bacteria thrive.
• Wash your produce in a colander (not right in the sink) to help reduce the risk of cross-contamination from the sink’s surface.
• When washing produce, simply rinse it thoroughly with running water; do NOT use soap, detergent, or commercial produce wash. as it’s specifically not recommended FDA.
• For pre-packaged produce that’s tightly sealed with a label that indicates it was pre-washed/ready-to-eat, there’s no need to wash it.

5. Use Microwave Properly

When heating your food with a microwave, be careful because microwaves tend to cook food unevenly—particularly foods that are thick or uneven in their shape such as meat, poultry, fish, and egg dishes. And that oftentimes leaves “cold spots” where bacteria can survive. Follow package instructions and rotate and stir foods during the cooking process if the instructions call for it. Observe any stand times as called for in the directions. Check the temperature of microwaved foods with a food thermometer in several spots to ensure doneness.

6. Discard leftovers promptly

Leftovers can only be kept in the refrigerator for a maximum of four days. After four days, you’ll need to throw those leftovers out or freeze them. If you know you’re not going to eat perishable foods within four days after you’ve made them, it’s best to freeze those foods right away to preserve them safely for a longer time

7.  Do Not Eat Stale Foods

Whether you are attending a party or giving one, remember the two-hour rule — never eat perishable foods that have been sitting out at room temperatures for more than two hours. At the two-hour mark, the warmer temperature creates a dangerous breeding ground for harmful bacteria to grow in the food—so that’s when you need to be diligent about putting those foods in the fridge or freezer (or simply tossing them out). Now, if the temperature is 32°C or more and your food has been sitting out, ONE hour is the limit.

8. Swap or clean your cutting board

If you’re using a cutting board for raw fish, poultry or meat, you should either get a new one or wash it thoroughly before cutting another food item. Raw meat juices make an ideal home for bacteria and it will transfer to other foods if it makes contact. If you choose to wash rather than pull out a clean board, you should use kitchen best practices. It is recommended you wash the cutting board with hot soap and water, and then douse it with a mild chlorine bleach solution. This kills any remaining harmful bacteria.

9. Use paper towels for meat clean ups

Using a cloth dish towel is great for eco-friendly practices, but you should avoid letting it touch raw meat. Clean the counter after cutting uncooked poultry, fish or meat with a paper towel, and then throw it in the garbage. A fabric dish towel will absorb the juices from the meat, and bacteria can grow. If you don’t think about it, you may then use the dirty towel to dry your dishes.

10. Wash your dishes immediately

While leaving dishes to soak might sound like a good idea (it helps lift the food off the plate), this practice promotes bacterial growth. All those particles sit in the food danger zone for an extended period of time, and the moisture from the water only speeds up growth. Wash your dishes as soon as possible using hot soapy water, then let them air dry. Towel drying is also acceptable, but air drying is the most sanitary option.

11. Don’t let temperature-sensitive foods sit out in the kitchen

Raw meat, fish, and certain dairy products can spoil quickly, so refrigerate or freeze them right away.

12. Separate raw meat and poultry from other items whenever you use or store them

 This precaution avoids cross-contamination of harmful bacteria from one food to another.

13.  Wipe up spills immediately

Keep the floor dry so that no one slips and falls.

14.  Store knives in a wooden block or in a drawer

 Make sure the knives are out of the reach of children.

15. Never cook in loose clothes and keep long hair tied back

You don’t want anything accidentally catching fire (not to mention hair ending up in the food!)

16.  Never cook while wearing dangling jewelry

A bracelet can get tangled around pot handles.

17.  Keep potholders nearby and use them

 Be careful not to leave them near an open flame.

18. Turn pot handles away from the front of the stove

Children can’t grab them, and adults can’t bump into them if they’re out of the way.

19. Get a fire extinguisher for your kitchen

This device may can avert a disaster. You should do your best to prevent a kitchen fire, but sometimes it’s out of your hands. So, make sure you know how to use the extinguisher before a fire breaks out. You can’t waste any time reading the directions amidst the flames. The carbon dioxide type of fire extinguisher is the recommended type for kitchen use.

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