Common Food Safety Mistakes Every Food Manager Should Avoid
Food safety is critical to preventing foodborne illnesses, which can cause serious harm to your customers and damage your restaurant’s reputation. However, even with the best intentions, food managers can make common food safety mistakes that can put their customers at risk. Training your staff on food safety techniques can help ensure every customer has a positive experience dining at your establishment.
However, training is just one part of the equation. You need to follow through with proper safety measures for everything from proper cooking temperatures to properly labeling foods—these are all things that can put you at risk for fines and costly legal action if not handled properly!
Common Food Safety Mistakes – What Are They?
Food safety is a shared responsibility. Food managers, employees, and owners all have a part to play in ensuring the food they serve is safe.
Food safety training is the key to preventing foodborne illness. Every employee at your establishment must receive training on handling a foodborne illness outbreak or contamination and what to do if someone becomes ill after eating at your restaurant.
Improper Cooking Temperature
One of the most common food safety mistakes is cooking food to its improper safe cooking temperature. Know the proper cooking temperatures for different foods. Different types of food require different cooking temperatures to ensure that harmful bacteria are destroyed.Â
It’s essential to know how long different foods need to cook at certain temperatures and what temperature they should serve.
Unsafe Food Holding
   ✓ Keep the food at the right temperature.
   ✓ Protect the food from flies and other pests, which can contaminate it with their droppings.Â
   ✓ Keep away raw materials from ready-to-eat foods (and vice versa).
Untrained Employees
One of the biggest mistakes that food managers make is not training their employees to handle food safely.
Food safety training is a legal requirement, so you must make it mandatory for your staff members. You can do this by requiring them to take online food safety training courses. You can even get them certified in food safety through AAA Food Handler Training Courses, which will help ensure they’re knowledgeable about proper practices and procedures when handling food items.
Unsafe Food Storage
To keep your food safe, you must ensure that it stores at the proper temperature. In addition, keep the food out of direct sunlight and store it in sealed containers. It’s also important not to store food near raw meat, fish, and eggs; this can cause cross-contamination.Â
Additionally, it’s important not to store items like garbage or cleaning supplies next to your refrigerator — or any other area where food stores — as these items may contain harmful bacteria that could contaminate any foods nearby.
Common Food Safety Mistakes:Â Confusing Labeling
As a food manager, you are responsible for ensuring that every item in your restaurant meets the highest quality and safety standards. Food labels are essential because they inform each product’s origin, ingredients, and preparation method. So, it is important to label the products correctly.
Sick Employees Preparing Food
The first step in preventing foodborne illness is to train your food workers in food safety. It means they should be able to recognize the symptoms of illness, understand how to prevent cross-contamination, and follow proper hand-washing procedures. Food workers should also be healthy and well-rested so they are not at risk of getting sick while preparing meals.
If you do find an employee who is sick, there are some steps you can take to minimize the risk of cross-contamination:
- Ensure other employees know about their coworker's illnesses so they can take precautions when working around them (for example, keeping their distance or wearing gloves)
- Keep the sick worker away from food, especially preparing or serving.
Common Food Safety Mistakes: Improper SanitationÂ
Sanitizing is a process of cleaning and disinfecting. It helps to ensure that your food preparation surfaces are free from contaminants, such as bacteria, mold, and yeast.
In addition to proper sanitation during food preparation, you should ensure that equipment is properly cleaned by washing it thoroughly with soap and hot water or placing it in an automatic dishwasher.
Why is Food Safety Training Important for Food Businesses?
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Food safety training is essential for food businesses to protect their customers. You can choose AAA Food Handler training courses accessible 24/7 to increase the knowledge of your staff about food safety, including
    ✓ How to prepare, handle and store food safely.
    ✓ Why food handlers should wear gloves.
    ✓ How bacteria grow in foods at different temperatures
    ✓ Food allergies
    ✓ Cleaning and sanitizing
    ✓ Waste management
    ✓ Handling chemicals safely
Food safety is one of the most important aspects of running a restaurant. It can be challenging to keep up with all the regulations and requirements that go into keeping your customers safe from Common Food Safety Mistakes, but it is well worth it in the end. Get your staff trained through AAA Food Handler safety courses and get the knowledge you need to keep your customers safe!
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