When people eat out, they often forget that their health is in the hands of others.
According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, 4 million Canadians fall ill each year from contaminated food, and food-related illnesses result in more than 11,500 hospitalizations and 250 deaths each year.
CTVNews.ca interviewed food safety experts about treating food with extra care when eating out, and the list may be longer than you think.
Keith Warriner, a food expert, trained and worked as a chef in the UK before completing his PhD and became Professor of Food Science at the University of Guelph in 2011.
Warliner points out that one way to eat out to reduce your risk of food poisoning is to eat out. It is to avoid eating high-risk foods in high-risk restaurants.
He advises that when you walk into a restaurant, look at the front of the house first, and if it looks good, at least the restaurant is doing well, because the kitchen will be worse.
Before ordering dishes at higher risk of food poisoning, diners should check their local public health website for red flags such as failing health and safety checks, assess the cleanliness of the restaurant and be mindful of how busy the restaurant is before ordering a dish with a higher risk of food poisoning. When business in restaurants is sluggish, food tends to stay longer, creating more opportunities for harmful foodborne pathogens to multiply.
He suggests that the methods for observing food safety are time, temperature, and apparent cleanliness. If it's an open kitchen, you can see what the people inside are doing.
With these tips in mind, food experts say that you should only order from restaurants that you truly trust.
According to Health Canada, leafy greens are already contaminated with harmful pathogens such as E. coli and salmonella as they grow in the field.
Michael Geintzler, a scientist at the University of Alberta at Edmonton who teaches food microbiology and microbial food safety, said vegetables sprouted from seeds can also be contaminated, especially sprouts, because organisms have a chance to grow during germination.
Sprouts and leafy greens can also be contaminated during packaging, processing, and shipping. Because it is eaten raw, there is no chance to kill these bacteria with heat.
Warliner, a food expert, explains that this type of food is beyond the restaurant's control, but in the restaurant, there can be cross-contamination, such as cutting the board, cutting the meat and then putting it on the salad.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, vegetables should be washed thoroughly, stored in a clean refrigerator with a temperature set to 4.4 degrees Celsius or lower, and chopped on a clean cutting board.
Experts describe eating half-cooked ground beef as playing "betting on Russian roulette".
Even at federally inspected plants, about 0.5 to 1 percent of ground beef batches are contaminated with E. coli. Therefore, there is a 1 in 1 or 200 chance that a medium-rare burger will make you sick.
E. coli tends to live on the surface of beef cuts, and these pathogens can be redistributed throughout the meat during the grinding process. That's why Health Canada states that ground beef should be fully cooked and the internal temperature should reach 71 degrees Celsius, while steak should be half-cooked at 63 degrees Celsius.
According to Health Canada, poultry such as chickens carry pathogens such as Salmonella and Campylobacter, which can cause severe diarrhea, fever, and abdominal cramps. To kill all the harmful bacteria that may be present on raw chicken, the chicken should be cooked thoroughly.
Therefore, experts recommend never eating poultry that doesn't look fully cooked or feels lukewarm when served.
Seafood and shellfish
Warrener, a food expert, says he never eats raw oysters because of the risk of norovirus and other gastrointestinal disorders — and he only eats sushi from trusted, high-turnover restaurants that are quickly served.
Part of the problem with seafood is that its high value means restaurants are reluctant to throw it away when it starts to spoil. The longer raw fish is left in the kitchen, the higher the likelihood of food poisoning.
Mussels and oysters are particularly risky than most fish because they feed differently. Mussels are filter feeders, and any microorganisms or viruses in the water are concentrated in the mussels.
Avoid buffets with low turnover
Experts recommend avoiding buffet-style restaurants with low turnover, as the food there cannot be eaten and replenished quickly, and restaurants do not easily throw away any food in order to make money. , because that's profit.
The steamer heating counter used in most buffets is not as efficient at keeping food warm, so the longer the food sits on the buffet counter, the greater the chance of harmful pathogens growing.
Also, focus on how restaurant staff refill buffet food and replace buffet containers completely once they are empty, rather than refilling or filling up with more food.
Oil immersion and condiments
Experts say garlic oil can be the source of botulism, a rare but serious disease caused by a toxin that attacks the body's nerves, causing breathing difficulties, muscle paralysis and even death.
This toxin is produced by Clostridium botulinum and some other clostridial bacteria that multiply in anaerobic or anaerobic environments.
Whereas, garlic is the source of Clostridium botulinum, while oil provides an anaerobic environment that allows it to grow.
Improperly stored or prepared mayonnaise can also contain foodborne pathogens. Homemade mayonnaise is especially dangerous because family recipes often don't require enough acid (the vinegar in mayonnaise) to kill bacteria that may be present in the raw eggs used to make condiments.