Food is one of those rare delights in life which words can’t do justice. It’s there when you’re sad and it’s there when you’re happy alike. A delicious meal can help you through the darkest of times. When it comes to different meals we have throughout the year, Christmas dinners are definitely right up there with the best and richest ones. Nothing beats a feast with your loved ones while celebrating the most wonderful time of the year.
Yet this wonderful time can turn sour quicker than you can imagine. A simple unwashed vegetable or contaminated hands can easily lead to food poisoning, and that would definitely put a damper on your Christmas spirit.
Food poisoning can be easily avoided through some simple, efficient steps.
What is food poisoning?
It’s basically a disease caused by eating contaminated foods. The most common reasons for food poisoning are parasites, viruses, and bacteria. The symptoms for foodborne illnesses vary, but these are the most common ones: nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pain, and fever. You’ll want to do your best to stay away from food poisoning. If you think that you might have eaten something dodgy, then there are a few things that you can do to prevent you from getting food poisoning. If you’ve eaten something recently and it doesn’t seem right, then some times it might be better to make yourself throw up (here are the common way to make yourself throw up). However, before getting to this step, it’s better to try and avoid consuming any bad food, so keep on reading to find out how to get avoid making this mistake.
Here are 7 tips to help you avoid those nasty symptoms.
1.Wash your hands, utensils, and cooking surface
Washing your hands with soap is essential to avoiding contaminating food. You should do this always before dealing with any type of food. You should also do the same with the utensils you’re cooking with, as well as the surface you’re cutting vegetables and anything on. Use hot, soapy water, not antibacterial sprays.
2.Keep raw food away from the rest of the food
It’s very important to keep raw meat and such from the rest of your veggies and bread, etc. This is because these won’t be cooked before eating, unlike the meat, which means they can contract the bacteria easily from raw food and that bacteria will not be killed.
3.Cook food thoroughly
You need to cook your chicken, meat, hamburgers, etc., thoroughly to make sure there are no bacteria left.
4.Stick to the expiry date
Even if it looks and smells fresh, once the expiry date is upon you, lose the food. These dates are not randomly set; they’re based on scientific experimentation and often give accurate estimations to the validity of the product.
5.Defrost in the refrigerator
Turns out the safest way to defrost food is in the refrigerator. Don’t defrost at room temperature. There are bound to be a lot more bacteria if the food is left out and exposed in contrast to defrost in the fridge, where it will do so at a temperature that doesn’t harvest bacteria.
6.Eat healthy food
Eating foods that are naturally built to fight parasites is always a good idea. There are a dozen types of parasites that contaminate food out there, and you want to be as safe as possible from those. This blog post gives you an idea on how to prepare natural parasite cleansing meals without too much of a hassle.
7.Throw when in doubt
If you’re not feeling at ease about how the food was prepared, cooked, or stored, it’s always best to throw it away. It might seem like much, but it sure as hell beats getting food poisoning. Better safe than sorry.
The joy of Christmas!
Food poisoning is not something you’ll ever want to experience, and even more so at Christmas! Wash everything and make sure to follow basic sanitary procedures while handling the food so that you don’t have to worry about putting a damper on the Christmas spirit, and are able to comfortably enjoy that all important special meal with your family and loved ones!
