There is another consideration with this: you hope that once an illness is identified, the medical personnel involved jump on it to get it resolved quickly. I speak from experience. Many years ago I got a bug that gave me the runs. I went to a local clinics, following which a sample was sent to a lab. For 11 days the clinic kept saying over the phone that they had not received the results (identification of viral infections takes time I was told), so I finally went there in person, to find that they had received the results in two days, but the dumbass who received them just filed them. Two days of antibiotics and I was fine.
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Well stated! Likewise, I shuddered at the information presented when I took the SafeServe course.
Off topic for a sec here, food safety and consumer finance are two courses that should be taught in middle or high schools.
I had seen some unsavory things working in a big time restaurant that were criminal. I was just a teenager and I should have said something to the manager and then quit. Instead, I said something and got fired. I should have gone straight to the health department, as incompetent as they could be.
Later in life when our son got a bad case of e.coli, it was me who did the detective work to locate the source.
A recent tragic event with morel mushrooms at a restaurant in Bozeman, MT tells a very scary story of food supply issues that are not brought to the publicās knowledge until unfortunately, it is too late.
We all have stories of food poisoning and illness. Educating ourselves is key. You gotta be constantly aware out there! KYF2!
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Amen!
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I am glad you survived that incident. Be safe!
Very similar situation with me, having a rare parasitic infection two years ago. Donāt know how I got it, foodborne or otherwise. I suffered from it for nearly two months after it was written off as food poisoning, gastroenteritis, then finally, without testing, I was prescribed antibiotics which did nothing. Finally, I suggested/asked for a stool sample to be taken, and within days, they diagnosed it, put me on an anti-parasitic pill for a week, and that was that. It was that simple, yet that difficult. The pill was three times a day, and literally before I got to the second pill the afternoon of that very first day, my stomach was āregularā. It pisses me off that it could have been solved so much quicker. It has made me paranoid ever since.
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I agree 100%. A lot of people never given it much thought when cooking, especially when in a busy kitchen. āOh this canāt happen hereā. But it certainly can.
Now that I am paranoid (see my previous post), I have stopped eating burgers out and when making them at home, I will cook mine well-done. I still do my steaks medium rare, in the hopes that the meat does not have some rare disease and the normal surface bacteria will be killed during the searing process. People always associate raw chicken and eggs with salmonella, but itās a surface bacteria that generally will be killed during a normal cooking process. But when it gets ground into your beef patty, you run a serious risk.
Not to turn this into a burger safety thread, but when I see people posting pictures of a rare or medium rare burger gushing with juices, it makes me shake my head because youāre playing Russian Roulette. Granted, most cases of food poisoning or undercooked food will result in maybe only a bathroom visit or two and then its out of your system. Or you might be that āone in a millionā and be sidetracked for weeks. Or die. Never know.
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I am also reminded of this local diner my friends and I would go to after playing hockey. No matter what any of us ordered, by the time we made it in the parking lot to say our goodbyes, we were all grabbing our stomachs and racing home. I am not exaggerating, running to the bathroom. It was always a one and done. But I never could figure out what the problem was because everyone had different meals, different drinks, etc. It didnāt matter if it was pancakes and coffee, a turkey panini, or pasta, it terrorized us. It was funny for a while, then I just stopped going. Itās been about four years now. Something was just not right.
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We had a few known Ptomaine Palaces around when we were growing up. One and done. Usually cheap eats and popular with the weekend crowds.
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Somebody BOH was being careless. Cross-contaminating between raw meats with cooked, inadequate refrigeration, or failing to wash hands after using the bathroom come to mind. Food safety can be a habit, but it has to be practiced rigorously to become one.
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I have been pleased to have seen restaurants sending their employees to SafeServe type courses. Education is key. Being able to tell the difference between he spray release can from the bug spray is important. (Yes, a true story about why omelets were tasting āoffā at a popular diner)
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And now we must add microplastics to our lists and fears. They are everywhere, literally. I always look for glass containers of packaged items. Even cans are lined with plastics. Skipping the bags for produce helps. Using glass food storage helps. Some things simply cannot be found in glass. Glass bottle of shampoos do not seem to exist.
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LoL yes, indeed Greg - kind of puts the fear of God in ya. Or fear of that Devil who forces you to worship at the porcelain throne.
My youngest daughter took the culinary concentration at her high school and ServSafe was part of that. They had a student-run coffee shop that served cookies, muffins, pastries etc. that the kids made. She helped get me more buttoned up in my cooking/processing at home. The way Iāve written that last sentence makes the process sound a lot more genteel than it actually happened.
She started working in an Italian deli & bakery in high school over holiday and summer breaks. Itās a pretty good sized space with usually 8 in the bakery and another 14 or so generally cooking/pizza/etc.
Our state food code for about 10 years now has required at least one restaurant employee with supervisory capacity to be certified. She was the only person in the joint with certification, she was not in a supervisory position, and so when she wasnāt working no one there was certified. Apparently the code change from 10 years ago still hasnāt made its way to the inspection forms because it has an unbroken string of score=100. Or maybe just no one cares.
This past year sheās been working at a coffee/tea/pastries joint in her college town, in the next state over. That state also requires at least one supervisor be certified. Theyāre the biggest coffee roaster in town with 8 locations. Not one person other than her is qualified.
Apparently no one there really cares, either. Itās like they put these requirements on the books and pretend businesses will comply without being told they actually have to comply.
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Because dropping a glass bottle in the shower ā¦ is not a good idea. You can get very nice bar shampoo, like soap. I have. Sits on a little wooden drainer dish when not in use.
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Do you still eat sushi? I had a neighbor who was a Maritimer who told me that her summer jobs consisted of pulling out worms from fish.
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I take my work lunches in glass. Glass est gut.
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The only sushi Iāve had since has been veggie based or shrimp tempura rolls (which I would not consider authentic sushi). I think there was an eel roll, but it was cooked.
I donāt think sushi caused it, since I did my own investigating and what I had needed an incubation period of two weeks and I had not eaten ārealā sushi for at least a month prior. But now Iām paranoid, so I just canāt do it even though I miss it.
And so many people get sushi delivered. Am I overreacting to say Iām horrified at that thought? Thinking how long the fish was sitting out during prep, then sitting waiting for the driver to pick it up, then the drive, then how long it takes you to eat it when delivered. That danger zone on raw fish adding up.
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Very true, and as far as I know in New Jersey, the same applies: one supervisor must be certified. The company I work for mandates that one person per shift be certified but given how scheduling goes in this short-staffed industry we live in, that never happens. But that doesnāt matter any way, as some of the worst offenses Iāve seen committed over the years have been by ServSafe certificate holders.
Anyone can take a test. Not everyone is committed to what the test is about.
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Literally hundreds of times. Never had even a minor issue. Or heard of anyone else getting sick.
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Same. And I eat raw oysters & rare meat all the time.
Of course, I also donāt shy away from the occasional beef tartare, or Mettbrƶtchen (a roll with seasoned raw ground pork & chopped onions - real date food 
).
Sounds dang good. I eat raw 95% ground beef on pumpernickel and raw onions and black pepper. Holiday tradish here.
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