Allergens focus of final lesson of National Food Safety Month

As September comes to an end, so does the 2014 National Food Safety Month, but food safety should be your focus every day as you run your restaurant. Each week in September, the Louisiana Restaurant Association has covered an important topic from ServSafe food safety and sanitation training course, using the theme, “20 Tips for 20 Years of National Food Safety Month.”  

Fifteen million Americans suffer from food allergies, so it is important for foodservice personnel to understand what the Big 8 are, how to avoid cross contact and how to identify an allergic reaction. The final lesson is about allergens and the Big 8.

A food allergy results when the immune system mistakenly attacks a food protein (food allergen). While more than 160 food items can cause allergic reactions, just eight of those accounts for 90 percent of all reactions. These eight foods are known as the “Big 8.” They are: tree nuts, peanuts, soy, egg, milk, fish, wheat and shellfish.

Cross-contact is the transfer of an allergen from a food containing the allergen to a food that does not contain the allergen. One of the most important ways you can keep guests with food allergies safe is by preventing cross-contact. Read steps to avoid cross-contact here.

The NRA and the LRA partner to offer ServSafe Allergens, an online, interactive 90-minute training course to assist restaurateurs and foodservice personnel in understanding and communicating the risks associated with serving guests with food allergies. The course is just $22 and can be accessed here.

Finally, there are six key symptoms of a food-allergic reaction. Below is a quiz you can do with your staff. The answer key can be found at www.foodsafetymonth.com.

What you don't know may make your guests ill



By Wendy Waren, VP of Communications, Louisiana Restaurant Association

Just this week, a friend of mine with a gluten allergy shared with me that she prepared a rice mix product for dinner that she thought was safe. Later that night she was so sick she thought she’d have to go to the emergency room. She found the package and while the ingredients list didn’t indicate a problem, a quick Google search revealed that the foreign rice mix may indeed contain wheat.

One of the most important things to do to prevent allergic reactions is to read the labels. The FDA requires that it be clearly identified on the label if a food item includes one or more of the Big 8 Allergens. For restaurants, reading labels is a vital step in the process of serving guests safely.

The labeling is acceptable if the common or usual name of an ingredient appears in the ingredients list. So if the ingredient is “buttermilk,” then it’s clear it contains the major food allergen “milk.” But sometimes it’s not so clear, and then the allergen’s food-source name has to be shown at least once on the food label. There are a couple of ways to do this: First, the label might list the common name of the allergen in parenthesis after its less common name and second, is a list of all allergens contained in the product in a single statement or a “contains” statement.

Allergens may also be hiding in labels under unfamiliar names. For example, milk may also be referred to as casein, lactoferrin or whey and eggs may be referred to as albumin, lysozyme or surimi.

With several friends and colleagues being diagnosed with a gluten allergy or sensitivity, I’ve really gotten a crash course in dining out with these types of challenges. Until I took the new ServSafe Allergens online course, I thought I had a solid handle on things, but I was wrong.

September is National Food Safety Month and this year’s theme is “Avoid a Reaction by Taking Action.” Food allergies go far beyond gluten or peanuts, and 90 percent of all Americans with them are allergic to one or more of what’s referred to as the Big 8, covered here.

National Food Safety Month-Week 2

This reading labels activity contains a list of the Big 8 and the unfamiliar names you may encounter. The activity sheet is really helpful particularly in the receiving area of a restaurant and for use in determining which food items containing allergens need to be separated from non-allergen foods.

A tragic story made national news this summer regarding the severity of peanut allergies in some children. A 13-year-old girl at a camp in California died because she ate a Rice Krispie treat she had no idea contained peanuts. Her last words to her mother were, “Mom, I’m sorry.” With 15 million Americans with food allergies and stories like this, now is the time to educate yourself and your staff.

The Big 8 and cross-contact subject of National Food Safety Month, Week 1

“Avoid a Reaction by Taking Action” is the theme of the 2013 National Food Safety Education Month, an annual awareness campaign by the National Restaurant Association (NRA) in partnership with the Louisiana Restaurant Association (LRA).  Due to the 15 million Americans with food allergies, the campaign spotlights the communication, training and education needed to attract these diners (and their families) and more importantly, provide them a safe meal.

A food allergy results when the immune systems mistakenly attacks a food protein (food allergen). While more than 160 food items can cause allergic reactions, just 8 of those accounts for 90 percent of all reactions. These 8 foods are known as the “Big 8.”

Cross-contact is the transfer of an allergen from a food containing the allergen to a food that does not contain the allergen. One of the most important ways you can keep guests with food allergies safe is by preventing cross-contact.

Here are steps to avoid cross-contact:

• Wash, rinse and sanitize cookware, utensils and equipment after handling a food allergen.
• Wash your hands and change gloves before prepping food.
• Use separate fryers and cooking oils when frying food for guests with food allergens.
• Prep food for guests with food allergens in a separate area.

Here are a few True/False questions to test your knowledge:

1. It is okay to use the same spoon to scoop peanuts and greens at a salad bar. True/False
2. Do not bake chocolate chip cookies on the same baking sheet as peanut butter cookies. True/False
3. It is acceptable to handle a banana-nut muffin and a chocolate chip muffin with the same pair of gloves. True/False

The NRA recently launched ServSafe Allergens, an online, interactive 90-minute training course to assist restaurateurs and foodservice personnel in understanding and communicating the risks associated with serving guests with food allergies. The course is $22 and can be accessed here.

Visit LRAblogs each week for a new activity to train and educate you on properly accommodating guests with food allergies.  

 

Answers: #1 False; #2 True; and #3 False.