By David Feder, RD
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F&B Magazine
The greatest compliment a chef can receive is when the plates come back clean. But one of the biggest challenges for today’s chefs is making sure plates go out clean — that is, clean of any unwanted microscopic critters. Chefs today face a huge challenge making they get as many stars for food safety as for cuisine — the threat of foodborne illness from Salmonella, E. coli and other dangerous microorganisms has increased in recent years.
This is due to a combination of more powerful microbes (one of the notorious bugs, E. coli O157:H7, is a mutated strain infamous for its virulence) and a wider source of ingredients that pass through a number of hands before reaching the kitchen (recall the inundation of Chinese ingredient scandals as well as domestic disasters that overwhelmed the news the past couple of years).
“We practice the normal ‘common sense’ stuff, of course,” says Robert Del Grande, Chef-Owner of Café Annie, Houston, and Co-Owner of the national Café Express chain. “But kitchen food safety doesn't mean much if your purveyors don't practice with the same rigor. You have to visit them as well.”
Although recent notorious outbreaks of E. coli have involved spinach and jalapeño peppers, meat is especially vulnerable since feedlot crowding of livestock has been shown to promote proliferation of the microbe.
“With respect to the E. coli, I think we have a lot more to learn about the conditions where animals become carriers and shedders of the bug and how our processing methods might limit their appearance,” says Joe Regenstein, PhD, professor of meat and dairy science at Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. “Salmonella is relatively ubiquitous, and until we make major efforts — many of which would be very expensive and would violate Proposition 2 (concerning animal welfare, public health, and environmentalism) — we're going to have problems.”
“At The Staunton Grocery we take storage a step further than most,” says Chef-Owner Ian Boden. The nationally recognized restaurant in the historic town of Staunton, Virginia, focuses on locally derived product. While this helps allay some of the worries of distant “invisible” sourcing, it poses other trials. “Realizing we would be dealing with whole animals versus buying prefabricated cuts, we saw that storage would be a large issue for us,” says Boden.
The solution? Boden invested in a Cryovac machine. “All of our meat and fish is vacuum packed as soon as it comes in,” he explains. “This keeps our walk-in clean and reduces cross-contamination risk, which is where most of foodborne illness occurs. Most restaurant walk-ins tend to have sheet pans with meat on them, where blood drips and pools. That’s a huge health risk. Because of our system we managed to eliminate that.”
Teamwork and training
“I’m a chef who believes in keeping an extremely clean kitchen because it translates to the plate,” declares Kent Rathbun, Executive Chef and Partner of Abacus and Jasper's in Dallas. “Every single person working in the kitchen is responsible for keeping their area clean and organized to ensure no mistakes.”
Rathbun focuses on food safety from top to bottom — literally. “I make sure there’s good lighting in the kitchen, and demand that all cooks and prep cooks wear non-slip sole shoes (to avoid spills as well as accidents).” Rathbun’s chefs, sous chefs, managers and assistant managers all are required to have a food safety certificate. “It is part of our manager training to teach everyone to mind the food safety basics as well as watch out for wet floors, broken glass, etc.”
Rathbun’s involvement of the whole house goes deeper — right into staff pockets. “It’s a part of our strategic plan that all managers and chefs are to maintain a 90 percent or above in their health scores, or it affects yearly bonuses,” he asserts.
Jonathan Gelman, Executive Chef of the 120-year-old Austin landmark, The Driskill Hotel, adds to the already stringent corporate- and state-mandated by conducting monthly in-house inspections. “All associates and managers are ‘ServSafe certified’ according to the Texas food-service statutes, which recently changed to mandate for associates, not just managers as previously [was the case],” explains Gelman.
Gelman also is implementing a "triple protection" program for employee hygiene, incorporating specific parameters for washing, nail brushing, sanitizing, re-washing then gloving up. “We employ a daily shift briefing and sanitation is part of our ‘script’ every shift, every day — plus we’re obsessive about hand-washing and sanitation consciousness in general,” he says.
For meats, Gelman has instituted separate coolers to store all protein foods. “Cross contamination on ready-to-eat foods is usually a major contamination source,” he notes. “Prepping and storing these types of food separately can greatly reduce the risks of foodborne illness.” He recently added a temperature log system for all protein coming off vendor trucks on arrival, plus “day dots” for day and date i.d.-ing.
Paper trails
Jay Valley, Corporate Chef for Eatzi’s Inc., Dallas, relies on an extensive record system to both ensure sanitation and provide traceability at the combination restaurant gourmet-takeout facility. “We have temperature logs for all refrigeration and they’re checked at least daily by the chef on duty,” he explains. “We also have a ‘cleaning matrix,’ a company binder that informs who, when and specifically how each piece of equipment, countertop, scale etc is to be cleaned and sanitized.”
Valley uses another documentation system in which all pertinent employees sign off on regarding temperature zones, personal hygiene practices, cross-contamination risks and other safety checks. “This not only helps with employee education,” says Valley, “but adds a sense of ‘ownership’ to the responsibility of keeping things safe and clean.”
Other tricks Valley employs above and beyond the standard requirements include: a dating system in which “use-by” dates are much shorter than needed to ensure the facility is always selling fresh food; structured, management- and employee-attended tastings in place every day and at every shift; and daily sales to keep product moving.
Valley warns about two oft-unrecognized risk signs: Overproduction — “If production is high you are probably selling old food” — and the false sense of security you can get from rubber gloves (“They’re good, but only sanitary when changed frequently — staff members must be trained how important it is to change gloves frequently,” he insists.)
Tools of the Trade
In addition to computer traceability, other high-tech tools are gaining ground when it comes to monitoring cleanliness. The Quick Check system from Camarillo, California-based Hygiena Inc. (www.hygiena.net) monitors adenosine triphosphate (ATP) – a biochemical compound found in all living organisms and biological residues. Within 15 seconds, Quick Check can detect ATP on a surface to show whether cleaning has been effective or if a surface is a potential site for the spread or harboring of germs. The system is simple to use: A swab taken from a sample area is inserted into a hand-held instrument, with results interpreted automatically and displayed within seconds. A “Pass,” “Caution” or “Fail” is then displayed. Restaurants also can use Quick Check system analysis and tracking software to:
• Provide cleanliness data in easy-to-read graphs and charts
• Identify restaurant surfaces that are not meeting cleaning standards
• Allow regional managers to pinpoint restaurants not performing to the QSR’s standards
• Email reports and alerts to designated recipients
As an alternate means to noxious chemicals and radiation treatments, Radio Frequency Company, Inc. (www.macrowave.com) rolled out its MacrowaveT Pasteurization Systems, which “use radio frequency energy to pasteurize bagged or bulk agricultural products.” The line also has been expanded to include pasteurizing systems for the treatment of nuts, various types of flour and other food ingredients, as well as finished products.
Fallsburg, N.Y.-based Murray's Chicken, a family-run poultry processor switched to electrolyzed water as its primary processing cleaning agent. via EAU Technologies Inc.’s Empowered Water. Electrolyzed water is created by combining salt and water with an electrical charge, separating the positive and negative ions of water to create two forms of water, one highly acidic and one highly alkaline. Research from the University of Georgia showed electrolyzed water to be as much as 10 times more effective at killing bacteria such as Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria, than other tested methods, including the use of heat. Successful trials, including several at the University of Georgia, have shown electrolyzed water is highly effective at killing foodborne bacteria without affecting the quality of the food. Empowered Water has been proven nontoxic and environmentally friendly when used at approved concentrations. At Murray’s, the alkaline EO water is used to clean chicken and is followed by a rinse of the electrolyzed acidic water to kill any remaining food-borne pathogens.
Editor’s note: This is part one of a three-part series on food safety practices.
