Don’t Fall Victim to Food Poisoning

You can follow four simple steps to make sure that you don’t fall victim to food poisoning. These steps are: Clean, Separate, Cook, and Chill.

Make sure you wash your hands, utensils, and surfaces often
When washing your hands, make sure to wash with soap and running water for 20 seconds
Surfaces and utensils should be washed after each use
You should wash fruits and vegetables, but not meat, poultry, or eggs
- Washing these items under running water can cause bacteria to splash onto the sink and countertop

Separate cutting boards and plates should be used for meat, poultry, produce, seafood, and eggs
When grocery shopping, keep meat, poultry, produce, seafood, and eggs separated from other items in the shopping cart and store these items in plastic bags to keep any juice from dripping on to other items
Make sure that meat, poultry, produce, seafood, and eggs are stored separate from other food items in the refrigerator/freezer
Eggs should be stored in their original carton on the main shelves of the refrigerator and not on the door

Make sure to cook all foods to the right temperature
- Use a food thermometer
After cooking, it’s important to keep food at 140 °F or higher to avoid the possibility of bacterial growth
When microwaving food, make sure temperature of food reaches a minimum of 165 °F

Refrigerate foods promptly
Perishable foods should be refrigerated within 2 hours
Refrigerator temperature should be between 32 °F and 40 °F
Freezer temperature should be 0 °F or below
Food should never be thawed on the counter
- thaw in refrigerator
- thaw in microwave
- thaw in cold water
- cook without thawing (this will increase cooking time by approximately 50%)

Don’t fall victim to foodborne diseases. Find out more information regarding food safety monitoring and save yourself from becoming a statistic.