Proper food handling at a competition
 

Not sure if this is the right forum to ask this or not, but here goes.

When you are at a competition and you are witness to BLATANT disregard for food handling, what should you do??? I was witness to some of the worst food handling I have ever witnessed this past weekend. These guys didnt have hot water, gloves, bleach, or any idea that meat should not sit out for 4 hours. In talking with these guys over the course of Friday night I offered to let them use our hot water and bleach bottle and even told them we had some extra gloves if they needed some. They declined all three. When one of the guys came over to offer me a taste of one of there ribs (which sat out for 4 hours) I politely made up an excuse and declined.

I guess my question is this: How do you go about telling someone that they are not doing the right thing without sounding like a know it all Jack A$%& ??? I am a chef for a living and have NO problem making sure that the people that work for me know what the heck they are doing, but this is a different beast.

Thanks for any input.

Clint


The worst part of this is these guys seved the public in the peoples choice.

WOW 62 people look at this post and NOone has nothing to say.. wow

if i saw all of that i would be very concerned..

Was anyone at the competition going around making sure teams were somewhat following health department rules? I think I would recommend it to the organizer after describing what you saw.

Sometimes hints don't work for some and they need the threat of a penalty before taking any action.

All other concerns aside, I guess that if someone offered me something that had been sitting around for 4 hours, I would probably ask them why it took them 4 hours to offer it to me.

Depending on the response, if any, I may go on to explain that I prefer my food fresh, and sanitary.

The ribs that sat out for 4 hours were still raw! I couldnt believe what I was seeing. Maybe we should add a quick food handling blurb at the cooks meeting??? Nothing big, but something about proper food handling techniques??????????

i would have told them about the 40-140, 4 hour rule. sometime you have to be an ass to get thru to people. don't worry about what they think, the person you saved from getting sick appreciates it.

if you feel uneasy about confronting them directly, tell the rep and they will (should) remind them about the rules.

Clint,

Was this a KCBS, MBN or some other sanctioned competition?

My last KCBS comp. I was inspected for Bleach, thermometer, wash/rinse/sanitizer facilities, fire extinguisher and meat holding.

If you saw ribs that sat out four hours raw, you should have notified the contest rep, it's their job to handle situations like that...

You could always mention to them that the cooks gotta look out for the judges by adhering to food safety standards and explaining to them that at many comps they are inspected for things applicable to food safety and give them some pointers. Kinda of the mentor approach if you know what I mean.

This was a KCBS sanctioned contest.

As far as the mentoring approach, these guys really didnt want to hear anything I had to say. They were the returning GC for this contest from the year before. It was not sanctioned last year and there were 8 teams. Anyway these guys "knew" what they were doing. In retrospect I guess I should have said something to the Rep. It just is hard to get into that kind of thing. I mean it really would have been my word against theres on the Time/Temperature abuse. I suppose the lack of gloves, hot water, and sanitizer could have been proven??? It is just a tough call to get the Rep involved. you know "nobody like a tattle tale," syndrome. I think if I see these guys again I will just be an ass and tell them like it is. Then if they have a problem we could get the rep then.

I can tell you, the Reps I know would want to be aware of the situation.

Reps often eat food that is left over from judging...

Exactly, ^^^^^. Look how many folks the "extras" get around to.

That is a tough one. If they are not receptive to begin with then confronting them yourself may just cause an escalated situation. Get the reps involved and take yourself out of it as much as possible.

On a side note: its hard to believe that there is not a meat, sanitization, and fire extinguisher inspection at the beginning of the event.

[sarcasm]

Look, it's obviously YOU that is the problem!

They were the returning GC after all.

Who are you to tell that what to do?

You don't even know enough to know that the ribs weren't raw! That pink look is a little thing us seasoned BBQers call the smoke ring! It's supposed to look like that!

:mrgreen: :biggrin: :mrgreen: :biggrin: :mrgreen: :biggrin: :mrgreen: :biggrin:

[/sarcasm]

I think I would have taken it up with the contest reps. The last thing I would want at my event is for some people to get sick.