Prevent Food Poisoning

During the warmer months, we tend to be more relaxed when we eat. Instead of formal candlelight dinners with floral centrepieces, we have informal picnics in the sun surrounded by fresh, living flowers. We have barbeques. We take a picnic hamper to the beach. This warmer weather really seems to make us thrive.

Warmer weather, unfortunately, also makes bacteria thrive. Summer is a particularly happy season for our old friend (not!) the E. coli bacterium that causes food poisoning. And salmonella. And just to make things worse, the flies that carry these bacteria to your food are also multiplying and doing their utmost to join in your picnics and barbeques. To make sure that you spend your summer playing in the sunshine instead of lying pathetically in bed frantically trying to rid yourself of the nasties in your system (i.e. vomiting and diarrhoea), it’s important to make sure that you prevent food poisoning happening to you.

Salads are one of the delights of summer that this writer always looks forward to. However, salads are eaten raw with minimal preparation. If you’re not careful, they can be a breeding ground for E. coli. Always make sure that you wash salad vegetables properly before adding them to the salad. This applies to conventionally grown veggies, organically grown veggies (remember: these have been grown with organic fertilisers, which means animal manure) and home-grown vegetables. If you’re really uncertain, or if you are visiting a place where the water is dubious, then rinsing them in water which has had iodine added to it will kill any bacteria. Finish by rinsing off in drinking water. Make sure any animal based products such as meat and eggs are cooked properly before adding them to a salad. Cheese is usually OK to add in. Once you have made your salad and added the dressing, then cover the salad and keep it chilled until the last minute.

Many people say that raw egg yolk is a carrier of salmonella. However, home-made mayonnaise calls for raw egg yolks. What do you do? Do you forgo “real” mayonnaise with lemon and egg yolk? In this writer’s opinion (backed up by a childhood of eating raw cake batter complete with raw eggs and several decades of using raw egg yolks in pasta and in “real” mayonnaise), if you follow the basic precautions of keeping the mayonnaise covered and cool, and if you make it at the last moment before serving, it should be OK – I haven’t had salmonella yet.

Also be careful with barbecues. Meat must be properly cooked to be safe. Chicken is the worst offender here. To be on the safe side, precook the chicken before finishing it off on the barbeque. This will also avoid the “burnt on the outside, raw on the middle” syndrome seen at so many barbeques. One common risky practice seen at many barbeques is using the tongs to handle or turn raw and half-cooked meat, waving them around in the air while talking, and then using them again to handle cooked meat and vegetables. Don’t do this – things that touch raw meat should not go and touch cooked food ready to be eaten straight away. If you have metal tongs, after handling raw meat, put the tongs into the flames of the barbecue (through the grille of the barbecue) before using them again – and don’t forget to use an oven mitt to pick it up again. Failing that, use one set of tongs for raw meat and another set for cooked things and veggies – maybe pass one set to a helpful friend to avoid muddle-ups. Serve barbeque food straight away – don’t let the meat sit
around.

Ideally, meat should not be thawed on the bench. In the fridge overnight is by far the best method that is much more energy efficient than using a microwave or running meat under a hot tap.

And you did remember to wash your hands before eating, didn’t you?