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The holidays is a time to entertain guests with food and festivity is a but if you do not store, prepare and cook your food properly you may end up with one guest you don’t want - bacteria.

Improper food handling can result in your food becoming a great host for bacteria which can cause food poisoning and make you and your guests sick. Bacteria is all around us every day but you can’t smell, see or taste it so you need to be sure to prepare your food properly so that it does not harbor harmful bacteria.

Proper food handling starts when you purchase your food in the grocery store. You’ve probably seen meats in Styrofoam packages with the juices leaking out. These juices can contain bacteria! You want to be sure to put these meets in a bag by themselves so that the juices don’t contaminate your fruits and vegetables or even your hands. Be sure to the meats in the cart at the end of your trip so that they will be thought of refrigeration for the least amount of time. When you get them home and pack them first and get them into the refrigerator right away.

When preparing your food you should always wash your hands before and after touching any meat. Also be aware that raw meat juices can get on your counters and cutting board so be sure to wash them with an antibacterial wash after you have prepared the meat. If you are grilling, and you put your raw meat on a plate to bring it to the grill, don’t use that same plate to bring the cooked meat to the table as it can have harmful levels of bacteria on it from the raw meat.

Believe it or not, we carry harmful organisms on our skin that can produce a toxin would spread to food. While normal cooking destroys bacteria It does not destroy his talks and so this is another reason that it’s very important to wash her hands with soap and water before you do any food preparation.

Defrosting can be a big problem. While it should be done in refrigerator, most people are impatient and leave their turkey or other meats out on the counter to defrost. This is a baf idea as a turkey defrosted on the counter instead of in the refrigerator can contain bacteria levels that are high enough to harm humans. Since the growth rate of bacteria speeds up between 40