Food Safety at Home
Food safety is important everywhere, including in your home. If food is not prepared safely, it can cause food-borne illness. Most food-borne illnesses are preventable and are a result of poor food handling methods.
Some good food safety steps you can take include:
Cleaning before, during, and after cooking
To help stay safe while cooking,
- Wash your hands often when preparing food. For more information about washing your hands well, visit Health Canada’s Hand washing and staying healthy page.
- Wash all of your utensils, cutting boards, counters with hot soapy water after preparing each type of food item and before moving onto the next item.
- Wash all fruits and vegetables before use.
Cooking your food to the correct temperature
Doing the following can help you stay safe while cooking:
- Ensure that you cook all food to the correct temperature.
- Use a thermometer to make sure the food reaches the correct temperature.
- Never use leftover marinade for basting or as a sauce unless you cook it before use.
Knowing the correct cooking temperatures
Cooking food to the correct temperature is important to staying safe, use the following to do so:
| Food product | Celsius (C) | Fahrenheit (F) |
|---|---|---|
| Poultry: Whole poultry | 82° | 180° |
| Poultry: Individual pieces | 74° | 165° |
| Mixtures: Containing poultry, eggs, meat, or fish | 74° | 165° |
| Beef, veal and lamb: Ground, deboned, or rolled roasts | 71° | 160° |
| Beef, veal, and lamb: Chops, steaks, or roasts | medium-rare: 63°C medium: 71°C well done: 77°C | medium-rare: 145°F medium: 160°F well done: 170°F |
| Pork: All products | 71° | 160° |
| Fish: All products | 70° | 158° |
| Eggs | 63° | 145° |
Chilling your food correctly
Keeping your food at the correct temperature is important, use the following information:
- Keep your refrigerator at 4°C (40°F) or below.
- Cool your leftovers and takeout foods within 2 hours.
- Use an ice pack or frozen drink to keep food cold in your lunch box until lunchtime.
- Defrost foods by:
- thawing it in the refrigerator.
- thawing it under cold, running, potable water or as a part of the cooking process; or in a microwave but only if you cook it immediately after.
Separating your foods to keep them safe
You should:
- Separate meats, poultry, and seafood during storage and preparation from foods that you will not cook.
- When shopping, use different bags for raw meats.
- Use separate utensils and cutting boards for fresh produce and raw meats, poultry and seafood; don’t cross-contaminate.
- To increase your food safety knowledge, consider taking the Safe Food Handler Course that we offer.