Risk of contamination of grilled meat during cutting by street roasters

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Extract from the article: The chopping board is an indispensable element in the restaurant business. It is used to cut all kinds of food, including grilled meat in street roasters. A good chopping board is essential for a good job, and above all you need to know how to...

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The chopping board is an indispensable element in the restaurant business. It is used to cut all kinds of food, including grilled meat in street roasters. A good chopping board is essential for a good job, and above all you need to know how to take care of it. But the cutting board is an utensil that is often neglected due to lack of hygiene.

Most meat grinders use these boards to cut up the pieces when serving the customer; unfortunately these boards are often poorly maintained and continually used even when worn and full of cracks. This bad practice favours the contamination of ready-to-eat meat because the old meat debris accumulated in the cracks of the board becomes a huge nest of harmful bacteria, responsible for toxi-infections, diarrhoea etc.

 

 

Some advice before and after using the boards

It is recommended that roasters use different cutting boards for different foods: one board for raw meat and poultry, and another for cooked products, to avoid cross-contamination between each food. In general, roasters use only one cutting board to cut the meat ready for serving. Normally at the end of the evening, it is advisable to clean this board to remove any meat debris left in the wooden slots. The various cleaning steps are: removing the meat debris, scrubbing with a metal sponge, washing with a dishwashing liquid and rinsing with hot water, disinfecting with lightly javelised water, drying in the open air or with a clean, dry cloth.

Some roasters cover the board with a piece of clean paper (recycled cement paper) before cutting the cooked meat. This practice is encouraged because the paper can be renewed after a few cuts and because the paper prevents contact between the meat and the wood surface.

 

Consumers should be more demanding when ordering grilled meat

Consumers are advised to be vigilant when ordering grilled meat. They should draw the attention of the roaster to check if the cutting board is clean or ask him to put a clean piece of paper before cutting the meat.

If the consumer does not trust the cleanliness of the board or paper, it is better to ask that the meat be served without cutting, especially if it is going to be eaten at home.

By being more demanding in this way, consumers help to force the adoption of good hygiene practices by roasters, and at the same time they avoid contamination by harmful microbes and preserve their health.

Source: VSF-Suisse