Food doesn’t just magically appear on a plate, cleaned, cooked, and ready for consumption; there’s A LOT to it before that point.
Something as simple as a tomato that had been grown on a farm can pass through several hands before reaching a kitchen or a market. The same applies to other foods such as leafy greens, herbs, fruit, dairy products, seafood, and all sorts of other ingredients that make a meal. This long and complicated journey is the reason behind food safety.
Food safety isn’t simple; actually it’s rather complicated.
It consists of keeping food safe at every stage of its development and transport (from growing to harvesting to transportation all the way to storage, preparation, and serving). If any one of these stages is mishandled, it can lead to the ingredient or food being ruined or simply not making it to the customer.
In this article, we’ll go a bit deeper into the interesting ways modern food systems work and why it’s SO very much important.
Where It All Starts
The first part of the journey begins long before the ingredient reaches a restaurant or a market.
Farmers have to think about factors such as water quality, soil conditions, sanitation, animal contact, harvesting practices, and how produce is handled after it leaves the field. Different foods all pose different and unique challenges, meaning that there’s no single process that works for everything.
If you take something as fresh produce, it can be exposed to contaminants (biological, chemical, and physical) through water, soil, equipment, or handling.
When we apply proper practices/procedures, this risk can be reduced to a minimum; even eliminated.
Transportation
When food is good and ready, it leaves the farm or the production facility; this is where transportation comes into play.And each food requires specific conditions and terms for it to be successfully transported.
For example, foods that are sensitive to temperature changes may need to remain within controlled temperatures. Packaging is also vital as it protects ingredients from contamination and damage. This, of course, has to be done within the regulated sanitary conditions.
Even foods that do not require refrigeration still need to be handled properly. A damaged package, contaminated surface, or poor storage condition can create problems.
A good thing is that when an ingredient or any food comes to a restaurant or any place of business, if it is damaged or spoiled, then those businesses can identify its source and, by doing so, inform them of it. This type of control allows any flaws to be detected and fixed, thus improving the whole process.
Grocery Stores/Restaurants
When the food reaches the grocery store or a restaurant, another set of practices comes into play.
Employees monitor storage conditions, rotate products appropriately, maintain clean preparation areas, and separate foods when needed. Some products require special attention; for example, refrigerated products whose temperature needs to be monitored. Even when the product is bought by the consumer, the consumer becomes responsible for its transport, storage, and preparation.
Unlike grocery stores, restaurants have their own set of obstacles due to the fact that they handle hundreds of ingredients every day, depending on the level and size of the kitchen. Due to this, any good kitchen staff needs to know (at least) the basics of food handling, including things like preventing cross-contamination and keeping food at proper temperatures, depending on the food item. Managers, on the other hand, have to watch their employees and make sure they properly do their job.
It’s a matter of organization and one on a large scale.
What Happens When Something Goes Wrong?
Yet despite all the precautions, knowledge, and vigilance that goes into making sure food stays safe, problems will still (unfortunately) happen.
Sometimes these problems are quickly identified. Sometimes they may take some time and effort. In these types of cases, investigators have to backpedal through the various stages of the food supply chain to truly grasp what went wrong and where it went wrong (and why).
Traceability becomes a key factor in such cases.
And traceability isn’t just about accountability, but also about prevention. If you know how and why something happened, you’ll be able to work in ways to help make sure the same issue doesn’t happen in the future (or at least minimize the chances). Various records such as suppliers, shipments, production dates, and distribution routes become essential to discovering these issues. Any spoiled food can cause harm to consumers.
It’s bad both for the consumer and the business.
Just look at the recent Cyclospora lawsuit. Something as simple as an Iceberg salad managed to cause such an issue simply because there was something wrong inside the food safety chain.
Someone/something failed to meet proper procedure, resulting in people getting ill and hiring law firms to look at their cyclospora lawsuit options to see whether they have a possible case on their hands and to see whether they’ll sue or not. That said, the legal aspect of food safety is a separate issue from the broader food safety regulations.
Still, in all circumstances, information is important in both preventing harm and fixing the very issues.
Conclusion
Whether it’s making food, transporting it, storing it, or preparing it, all stages are equally important.
After all, food is something that is consumed daily by every person in the world.
There’s little to no room for mistakes, as mistakes can cause serious problems on both the financial side and, more importantly, on the well-being side of people – food safety is a shared responsibility.
2 Interlinking Opportunities:
From https://ediblebrooklyn.com/event/food-safety-101/ with anchor food safety
From https://ediblebrooklyn.com/resources-guide/the-business-fundamentals-behind-brooklyns-best-food-startups/ with anchor food businesses
