When do we get cooking I wanna eat!!!!

O.k., O.k., calm down! We'll be cooking,but there's something that we need to do first! We need to discuss something really important. We need to discuss food safety.

Here are four steps to food safety that are worth following. They are: Clean, Separate,Cook,and Chill(and no this doesn't mean chill out kick back and relax. This means something else- well more on that later.) This entry will deal with keeping it clean

CLEAN:

WASH HANDS AND SURFACES OFTEN

Bacteria can double in numbers every 20 minutes.That means bacteria(just one  even) on a  kitchen counter top can multiply to more than 34 billion in just 12 hours.  Bacteria can spread . If you are not careful it can spread through your kitchen.The bacteria will wind up on your counter tops, cutting surfaces and boards, utensils,you name it bacteria will spread there! So to prevent that, you can do the following:

*Wash your hands properly with hot soapy water before handling food and after doing such things as: using the bathroom , handling raw meats, changing diapers,blowing your nose,handling pets, handling things from outdoors (mail,shoes,keys, etc.)

*Wash your food preparation surfaces (counter tops , cutting boards) and your utensils(preferably with hot soapy bleach water). Wash your food prep surfaces especially if you know that something unclean has been up there ( here again I repeat about outside items) and  to this I add- especially if you own pets- particularly cats.(They are sweet animals,lots of fun to have, but, they are known for hopping up on surfaces.)

*Use plastic or other non porous cutting boards. These boards have the ability to withstand being put into the dishwasher,or withstand being properly washed and disinfected with either regular hot soapy water and/or hot soapy bleach water after use.

* Paper towels are excellent tools to  use when cleaning up kitchen surfaces. These are excellent because they are disposable. Using cloth towels are o.k.,but consider the fact that you must wash them often in the hot cycle of your machine in order to clean and disinfect them properly. Sponges are the worst cleaning tool of all when especially when it comes to disinfection. The average sponge can be a safe haven for as many as 7 billion germs. (remember that these bacteria can double every 20 minutes)

* I know that I am getting ahead of myself here, because I was going to talk about this when I talk about cross contamination, but I'll go ahead and talk about this anyway:

       Use different cutting boards for meat and produce. If you do ,however, have to  use the same cutting board, make sure....make sure....make sure to wash the board thoroughly in hot , soapy, bleach water . Keep the surface wet for at least 2 minutes. Before using your board , it would be a best to rinse with a solution of 1 tablespoon of bleach per gallon of water.

       Don't rinse or soak the cutting board overnight. Leaving things soaking just creates a huge soup bowl of germs in your sink. You're just marinating those germs overnight!

    The Bleach Solution:

         To Sanitize

   3 table spoons of bleach per gallon of water

Those are my hints for this entry. Tune in next time as we talk about :

 Please separate. Don't cross-contaminate!