How Much Could These Simple Food Handling Mistakes Cost you?

Whether at the Chez Michael restaurant, the Heron Rock Bistro or the 4 Mile Restaurant & Pub or for that matter, any restaurant at all in Melbourne, food safety is vitally important. No matter how fantastic your business may be, a simply food handling mistake by your staff could be a serious, even insurmountable setback to your business.

The restaurant business is all about repeat customers and public perception of your establishment. Your reputation is everything. If you have even one lawsuit concerning food handling or food preparation mistakes in your kitchen, it can spell disaster- not just for legal defense fees, either. Your reputation could be seriously harmed, even ruined.

You have to take some basic steps to ensure food safety as well as making sure that all of your kitchen staff are well aware of the risks of food poisoning and other food borne illnesses. Additionally, you must be prepared for surprise health inspections, these can happen at any time. An employee who witnesses improper food handling can also be disastrous for your restaurant, since they may decide to tell others - especially should they lose their job.

And there is more to this than simply properly storing food and disposing of waste.

You must keep all food preparation areas clean at all times. This sounds easy but is often neglected as well. Different cutting boards have to be used for cutting meat, vegetables and seafood. Some restaurants use stainless steel counters for this as they are very easy to clean. This tends to dull knives and can also give an off flavor to meats - harmless, but hardly desirable. Better than this are plastic cutting boards which are very sanitary compared to wooden cutting boards and are easy to clean as well. After each use, cutting boards must be washed very thoroughly. Bleach may be used - but be sure to rinse very well afterwards if you are using bleach to clean your cutting boards.

Utensils also must be washed after each dish they are used to prepare.

To keep them free of harmful bacteria, meats must always be cooked to a minimal internal temperature. For red meats and pork, this temperature is a minimum if 69 degrees centigrade. For seafood it is 74 degrees. Even if a rare steak has been ordered, it must be cooked to at least this minimum temperature for at least 15 seconds to minimize the risk of food poisoning. Any meat which is not very fresh should be cooked to very well done.

Raw foods like sushi call for extreme caution in their preparation. Your kitchen must be perfectly clean, as must your staff. Disposable gloves and hair coverings are needed and the preparation area must be spotless. You should throw away any sushi which is not perfectly fresh - and you should be very certain of the quality of your supplies for sushi.

It is surprising how many kitchen workers neglect to wash their hands with soap and hot water in between meal preparation, even when raw meat is involved. Hand washing between meal preparations is a must and washing hands in between say, handling meat and vegetables is a very good idea.

By enforcing a strict kitchen sanitation and food handling program, you will be protecting the interests of your customers as well as those of your restaurant.