- Author: Shelby MacNab
Why is there a turkey in the garage?! If you’ve ever found yourself asking any variant of this question, trust us - you’re going to want to read on.
As the holiday season approaches, we begin to think about spending time with our families, enjoying one another’s company over the many feasts that accompany special days. While we may set aside mindful eating during the holiday season, we should not set aside food safety.
In many families, once the holiday meal is served it may sit on the table for 2-3 hours while people come and go, “picking” from the various serving dishes. The most creative food safety flub goes to a family member who thaws her holiday turkey in her garage. Her justification of this practice? “I...
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Whether to save money or to dine on fresher products, more Californians have been buying locally grown food and growing their own lately. They also have started home canning what they can’t eat right away. But be aware that if you put them up incorrectly, those garden goodies can be deadly.
I’m no domestic goddess so I learned a lot about home canning recently while watching Susan Algert, UC Cooperative Extension nutrition advisor for Santa Clara County, make a 2-minute video describing safe canning tips.
Meats, vegetables and any food containing meats and vegetables -- such as salsa or...
- Author: Mary E. Reed
With a daughter soon to complete a degree in health safety, discussions of Salmonella, E. coli and the like sometimes arise as we sit around the dinner table. As an agriculturally focused family, we like to think we’re pretty savvy about the best way to handle our produce to keep it safe and tasty.
Some are very concerned about food safety. A gentleman phoned the Postharvest Technology Center a few months ago, and shared that he was very concerned about eating strawberries. He thought perhaps he should scrub each one with a soft toothbrush, and then soak them in a diluted chlorine bath.
Others are much less aware of food safety concerns, sometimes using cutting boards and knives interchangeably between...
- Author: Ann King Filmer
Mention that something is free and useful, and most of us will stop to take a look. And for good reason — the University of California has a number of websites that offer free information related to food.
Take your time to peruse the sites listed below. There is some fascinating and very handy information to be had. Many of these sites also offer terrific publications at nominal prices, but this blog lists only those that are free . . . and we all love a bargain! Many more publications and programs are available than those listed below.
After looking at these lists, you never know when you’ll be inspired to pickle some olives or field dress a deer. As for me, my latest food craze is cheese-making. Two weeks ago...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
When Bill Clinton was president in the 1990s, his Council on Food Safety identified eggs as a food that poses a risk to children, the elderly and people with compromised immune systems. The Clinton administration launched a safety plan that aimed to eliminate Salmonella contamination in eggs entirely by 2010.
Unfortunately, the goal was not met. This month, a vast outbreak of Salmonella food poisoning prompted the recall of half a billion eggs produced in Iowa. In California, UC Cooperative Extension worked with other agencies and the egg industry to create the California Egg Quality...