This holiday season will soon be serving up parties, many of which will be buffet style. Whether it’s dining at a buffet restaurant to feed a house full of hungry guests, a catered event or a pot-luck get together, it’s important for all parties to understand food safety.
Mary Benberry, director of food and nutrition services at St. Vincent Carmel states that most restaurants and catered events are safe but a red flag to bacteria and foodborne illnesses is the holding temperature. Temperatures should be checked often and in the simplest form, cold food should be cold and hot food should be hot.
“Cold food should be below 40 degrees. With hot food, the danger zone is between 41 and 105 degrees. That’s where bacteria can grow,” explained Benberry. According to the Partnership for Food Safety Education (PFSE), hot food should be kept at 140 degrees or warmer.
As of Jan. 1, 2005, the Indiana State Department of Health requires that food establishments must have at least one person that has a state required ServSafe certification to make sure food is being served properly.
The PFSE further suggests providing a new serving dish when adding fresh food. Many people’s hands may have touched the food, which also may have been sitting at room temperature for a while. Empty platters should, instead, be replaced with clean, freshly filled ones.
Although food should be at the proper temperature and constantly stirred, those providing buffets should remember food safety doesn’t begin once the items are available to guests. Kitchen cleanliness and avoiding cross-contamination should be high on the priority list.
For example, cross-contamination can occur if one is cutting a raw chicken and simply rinses the cutting board before preparing a relish tray. No matter how safe you are in cooking or serving the food item, it’s never going to be enough to kill the harmful bacteria.
Separate raw meat, poultry, seafood and eggs from other foods and use a different cutting board for produce.
Food preparers have a lot on their plate in handling food properly, but consumers also play a vital role in food safety.
Most restaurant buffets have sneeze guards, but Benberry states restaurants should always have one person watching customers for those who are below the sneeze guard or using their hands to pick up food, especially children.
“We’ve had people come in and actually grab a tomato to put on their sandwich with their bare hands instead of using the tongs. When that happens, we throw everything out,” said Benberry.
It is up to the restaurant to constantly stir the food, but if customers notice food sitting out longer than two hours, or one utensil being used for more than one food item, they should alert an employee.
If consumers are all the more suspicious of restaurants or catering companies, they can always check restaurant health records at the Marion County Health Department. If consumers also suspect they have food poisoning, they should contact their physician. Symptoms usually occur after four to five hours and include diarrhea, vomiting and fever.
All food safety tips should not only be applied to restaurant and catered buffets but in private buffets as well.
For more information, call the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Food Information line at (888) SAFE FOOD or visit www.fightbac.org.
