Environmental health in Etelä-Häme advises how to avoid food poisoning at summer parties

Summer is a time for parties. In the coming weekend, high school graduates and young people who have graduated from a profession will be celebrated, later in the summer it will be the turn of the graduation parties and midsummer.

Many people prepare their own food for parties. Etelä-Häme environmental health listed guidelines that home cooks can follow to avoid food poisoning at summer parties.

Take care of hygiene

• Rinse the vegetables thoroughly.
• Use different frying pans and utensils for vegetables and raw and cooked meat and fish. Wash the equipment thoroughly.
• Wash your hands at the beginning and between work steps. Use liquid soap and paper, because bar soap and a towel are not as hygienic. Close the tap with your elbow or paper.
• Disposable gloves protect food from contamination. Gloves are only worn on clean hands. They must be changed if they apply to food other than unpackaged food.
• Be careful not to mix allergenic ingredients with foods that shouldn't contain them.
• Pets' fur emits dust into the air, so they should not be in the kitchen while food is being prepared.

Remember the correct temperatures

• Heat foreign frozen berries for at least five minutes.
• Heat the food hot enough, i.e. at least 70 °C all over. In a microwave oven, food heats up unevenly.
• Take care of sufficiently cold storage temperatures and the cold chain from the store to home, so that bacteria do not have time to start growing in food. The refrigerator should be 6 °C (an even colder 3 °C for fish).
• Serve food immediately, cold food cold and hot food hot (at least 60 °C).
• Only serve as much food as you need and top it up if necessary. Food that has been served does not preserve in the same way as food that has not been served.
• Cool the food to refrigerator temperature in four hours.

Do not cook for others when you are sick

• Do not cook for others if you or a member of your family is sick. Take a break and clean the house after being sick. For example, norovirus can be transmitted from surfaces for up to 14 days.
• Check the date markings and read the handling instructions. The food should not be used after the expiry date. The best product marked with the date before can be used if it does not smell, look or taste spoiled.
• If you prepare food portions for sale at home, register a food apartment and contact your municipality's food control.

Environmental health in Etelä Häme operates in the areas of Riihimäki, Janakkala, Hausjärvi, Lope, Tammela, Forssa, Jokiointe, Humppila and Ypäjä.

Read more on the food control website.