We have established that cross-contamination can occur just about anywhere in the kitchen, but the most common source is the people working in it.

The threat of swine flu is sweeping the nation. Much like we have seen with bird flu, SARS and mad cow disease, the public is enamored with the idea that a newly discovered illness is going to hit every home at some point and nobody is safe. While this is certainly almost always an overreaction spurred by fear-driven media outlets, I am almost always pleased with the end-result of the resulting public paranoia – shedding light on one or severalcrucial components of food safety.

The latest swine flu epidemic is no different; as person-to-person contact is the most common way this virus is being transmitted. This brings to light the importance of not only hand washing, but awareness of the potential for spreading pathogens through cross-contamination.   

Cross-contamination is defined simply as the spreading of bacteria or viruses from one surface to another. There are many ways that this can happen, and in this article we will explore them and the best methods of prevention.    

The theory behind cross-contamination is that anything that touches food can contaminate it, therefore anything that touches anything that touches food can cause contamination, as well. For example, if I am cutting chicken breasts and I wipe the knife with a towel containing bacteria, that bacteria will be passed onto the knife, and subsequently onto the chicken when the knife comes into contact with it. Then, anything the chicken touches before it is thoroughly cooked will also become contaminated.    

It is fairly easy for this chain of events to take place, so all foodservice employees need to be mindful of how easily something like this can happen and how best to prevent it. As an eye opener, the following is a list of things that are commonly found in most restaurant kitchens that have been known to be sources of cross-contamination:

• Employees’ hands
• Cutlery
• Kitchen equipment (including mixers and meat slicers, cloth towels, doorknobs and drawer handles, countertops and cutting boards)   

Does your establishment use any of these things? Of course it does – so training your employees to be aware is the first step in the defense against cross-contamination.

Look Ma, Clean Hands!
We have established that cross-contamination can occur just about anywhere in the kitchen, but the most common source is the people working in it. Therefore, the best way to nip cross-contamination in the bud is to make sure your employees wash their hands often and properly.    

I recently saw a swine flu story on the news that suggests people should wash their hands for as long as the song “Happy Birthday” lasts. While the vision of people across the country singing “Happy Birthday” to themselves as they lather and rinse somewhat amuses me, the overall message is that washing your hands should last 20 to 30 seconds.    

Employees should use water as hot as they can stand, use a liberal amount of anti-bacterial soap and a scrub brush for their nails. Lathering their hands and forearms thoroughly, they should then rinse all of the soap off and dry their hands using a paper towel and not a cloth kitchen towel as those will often have bacteria on them – which would defeat the whole point of hand-washing in the first place.   

I also recommend that you should use paper towel when turning the water off because the faucet handles may often be contaminated. The most common question I receive as a food safety educator is: “How often should we wash our hands?” The best answer I can give is that you should wash your hands after touching anything that could be contaminated, such as doorknobs, money, other people, raw food products, unclean kitchen equipment, dirty utensils, or anything else you can think of.   

In addition to hand washing, your employees should also be clean and sanitary at all times. They should shower before coming to work, have their hair tied back if long and wear as little jewelry as possible. Microbes love to hide in the little nooks and crannies of rings, bracelets and necklaces so you want to minimize that possibility.

Sanitize before using Remember a couple paragraphs ago when I mentioned all the things that could potentially be contaminated in your kitchen? Well, now it’s time to make sure they are as sanitary as they can be. Let’s start with cutlery and kitchen equipment; after every single use these items need to be both washed and sanitized.    

The small stuff (knives and such) can be run through the dishwasher. The mixers and slicers are another story. These are important instruments to any restaurant’s success and they need to be treated as such. Once they are finished being used, they should be taken apart as much as reasonably possible and each piece should be cleaned with hot water and some type of antibacterial soap. They should then be sanitized using a sanitizer/water solution and allowed to let dry completely before the next use. All cutting boards should be thoroughly washed after each use. You will also want to regularly use sanitization wipes on countertops, doorknobs and drawer handles as much as possible during each shift.   

As far as kitchen workers go, one of the most common mistakes that occurs is the overuse of cloth kitchen towels. How many times have you seen a line cook pick up an already used towel and wipe down a countertop or knife? While I realize clean kitchen towels cost money, they are not meant to be utilized for more than one use because the potential for cross-contamination is always there. When you repeatedly use the same towel over and over again, all you are doing is spreading bacteria throughout your kitchen.

Safe Than Sorry
I am going to be straight with you: You probably won’t catch swine flu, and most likely neither will any of your patrons (at least from your establishment). That still doesn’t mean that your employees shouldn’t be going out of their way to do what they can to prevent it. Not only will they be preventing swine flu, they will be preventing many other causes of foodborne illnesses in the process.   

Media-fear tactics are not always such a bad thing.

Lee Biars is the director of industry relations for Safe Food Solutions. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or safefoodsolutions.com.