Sharing information can make science of restaurant food safety easier to apply

THE NUMBERS ADD UP TO A TREMENDOUS opportunity" Every week, Americans consume an average of 4.2 meals that are prepared away from home--that's 218 meals per year and increasing. By 2010, the restaurant industry will operate more than 1 million units, with sales of $577 billion capturing 53 percent of the consumer food dollar. Will one or more of those units be yours? It can happen--if you have the right recipe for restaurant success.

Most baby boomers can easily remember when "going out to eat" was a special event; today, restaurant meals are an integral part of our everyday lives. Whether we're grabbing a sandwich on the run, sitting down to a leisurely gourmet dinner at a five-star establishment or enjoying one of the many choices in between, we're eating out more than ever--and the trend is expected to continue. There's never been a better time to open a restaurant.

Experienced restaurateurs say that this is definitely a business where you can make a lot of money quickly--but you can lose it even faster if you don't have three key ingredients: industry experience, adequate capital and a thorough knowledge of the market you're serving.

Start With a Job

Successful restaurateurs agree that the best preparation for owning a restaurant is to work in someone else's first. Think of it as getting paid to be educated. "You'll learn a lot about things you never thought about," says industry expert Rich Melman, chair of Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises Inc., a Chicago-based company that owns, manages and consults with restaurants throughout the country. "There are hundreds of little things, each not being of great consequence as a single issue, but of big consequence when you put them together."

Certainly you should read books and take courses, but plan to work in a restaurant for at least a couple of years doing as many different jobs as possible. And if you're not actually doing the job, pay attention to the person who is--you may find yourself doing it when your own restaurant is unexpectedly shorthanded. "I've had to cook when I've had chef problems," says LaVerna Gilbert, 42, co-owner and general manager of Shelly's Courthouse Bistro in Santa Ana, California.

"With experience will come the knowledge that you know what you want to do," says Melman. "Are you certain you're going to love it, or is it going to wear off? It's your love for what you're doing that pulls you through difficult times." Ideally, work in a restaurant similar to the type you want to open. You may find you don't like the business. Or you may find you're more suited to a different type of operation than you originally thought. You might even discover you're in exactly the right place.

"As I started working in restaurants, I realized this was my passion," says Scott Redler, co-owner and founder of Timberline Steakhouse & Grill in Wichita, Kansas. Redler, 42, got his first restaurant job at 15 opened a Chinese fast food restaurant at 26 that failed in eight months, and now has five successful steakhouses. He also opened two Freddy's Frozen Custard restaurants. "When you have a busy restaurant and you're watching everything happen as it should," he says, "it's a wonderful feeling of satisfaction."

"Everyone likes the idea of owning a restaurant, but it's easier to invest money than it is to work it," says Gilbert. Her advice: If you don't like the work but you still want to own a restaurant, find a good operator to partner with.

Decision Time

Armed with practical experience, you're ready to decide what you want to do and put together your business plan--the most critical element of your restaurant. Map everything out on paper before you buy the first spoon or crack the first egg. Melman says 80 percent of what makes your restaurant a success will take place before you ever open the doors.

Your business plan should include: a clear definition of your concept; a description of your market; menu and pricing; detailed financial information, including start-up capital (amount and sources) and long-term income and expense forecasts; a marketing plan; employee hiring, training and retention programs; and plans to deal with challenges restaurateurs face every day. Bill Ellison, 30, and Frank Perez, 31, co-own and operate Frasier's, a sports bar in Apopka, Florida. Ellison recommends including an exit strategy. "Know how you'll get out if things go bad, as well as how you'll get out if things are going good," he says.

Be thorough, but don't write your plan in concrete. "You have to go into it being flexible," Ellison says. "Don't say 'This is what I have to offer; take it or leave it.' Open with an idea, then evolve to what the customers want."

Putting the Plan Into Action

Once you've decided on the concept and market, begin scouting for a location. Issues to consider when choosing where to put your restaurant:

* Area demographics: Do the people who live and work in the vicinity fit the profile of your target market?

* Traffic: Consider foot and vehicle traffic. How many pedestrians and cars go by daily? How accessible is the location to passers-by?

* Parking: Is the parking adequate, convenient and safe?

* Nearby businesses and other elements: What's around the location, and how might it affect your operation?

* Future development: Check with the local planning board to see if anything, such as additional buildings or road construction, is in the works.

If you're considering a location that has been the site of another restaurant, study its history so you know why the previous operation failed--and be sure it's something you can overcome.

It's the Food
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Service, ambience, management--it's all important, but most restaurants are known by their menus. Create a menu that is memorable and appropriate to your concept and to your market. Frasier's menu includes items from similar establishments as well as unique dishes. "Every restaurant should have signature items," Ellison says.

Setting prices can he a mathematical challenge. To calculate prices, consider your food costs, labor (for preparation and serving), overhead and profit. Survey other restaurants to get a sense of what price levels the market will support. If a dish isn't both delicious and profitable, take it off the menu.

Got Money?

A thorough plan should show how much money you'll need to open your restaurant--building, furniture, fixtures, equipment, inventory, liquor license and working capital. With that figure in mind, look at your financial resources. If you don't have or can't raise enough, scale the number back.

Redler says raising the money wasn't as difficult as he thought it would be. The key is to demonstrate to investors that you have a solid plan and the experience to implement it. Also, you must be willing to significantly risk your own funds. When Redler opened his first Timberline, he contributed $24,000 of his own money and walked away from a high-paying corporate position. Because he was willing to risk so much, his backers felt confident taking a chance with him.

Follow the Rules

Though we don't think of food service as a heavily regulated industry as we do medical services or public utilities, the reality is that many aspects of your operation are strictly regulated and subject to inspection. Fail to meet regulations, and you could be subject to fines or get shut down by authorities. And if violations involve tainted food, you could be responsible for illness and even death. Issues such as sanitation and fire safety are critical. You must provide a safe environment in which your employees can work and your guests can dine, follow the laws of your state on sales of alcohol and tobacco products, and handle tax issues, including sales, beverage, payroll and more.

Most regulatory agencies will work with new operators to let them know what they must do to meet the necessary legal requirements. Your state's general information office can direct you to all the agencies you'll need to be concerned with.

The science of safe food handling in restaurant kitchens is well known. From microbiology we know that time and temperature, personal hygiene, cross contamination, and cleaning and sanitizing are essential for fighting bacteria. HACCP, a science-based approach, identifies critical points in food handling and requires that controls be put in place to prevent food contamination. And new work in the behavioral sciences shows how management practices and organizational behavior processes can undermine food safety goals.

But while the science of food safety is well-organized and firmly established, the practice of it in restaurant kitchens is less so. Although restaurant operators throughout the country are frightened of the possibility of a food-borne illness outbreak occurring in their restaurants, they are hindered in their efforts to prevent one for several reasons.

First, restaurant owners, managers and cooks are not scientists. They neither think like scientists nor act like scientists.

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Second, food handlers are not easily convinced of the need to handle food safely given that the consequences of not doing so are not immediately apparent. The effects of food-borne illness are delayed and hard to trace, and food handlers know that. They are aware that safety rules can be violated repeatedly with no adverse consequences until the day a food-borne illness outbreak occurs.

Third, scientific-based food safety solutions can be costly to implement. Also, many solutions, such as proper hand-washing procedures, are not practical.

Lastly, operators and their employees have no easily accessible place to go to find out what works and what does not.

In spite of those formidable barriers and in addition to legal mandates, foodservice operators have many options for trying to prevent food-borne illness in restaurants.

Technology is a major weapon used to achieve safe food production. Some examples are refrigerated loading docks for the delivery of cold and frozen foods, hand-held computers for temperature monitoring, bar-coded technology that allows for product temperature monitoring, high-tech hand-washing sinks that control and monitor employee use, and no-touch soap and paper towel dispensers.

Some operators require employees to get a Hepatitis A vaccination, some mandate the use of disposable latex gloves and others put food-safety warnings on menus and conduct surprise health inspections. One large, international hotel chain has developed a wordless food-safety-training picture book.

In a lighter vein some restaurateurs play food-safety bingo, a contest during which employees are encouraged to find and identify unsafe conditions. A microbiologist has written several food-safety songs complete with video clips.

In addition, safe food handling in the kitchen is encouraged by the use of color-coded cutting boards, knives, sheet pans, towels, storage bins, brooms, mops, buckets and waterproof rotation labels and marking pens. Antibacterial wash for fruits and vegetables also is gaining popularity.

Obviously, no operator can do all of those things to fight food-borne illness in the kitchen. In fact, a recent informal survey suggests that most operators are doing little or nothing, while others are doing only what the law requires.

What are you doing? We have set up a Web site at the School of Hospitality Management at Florida International University. Visit our user-friendly site at http://hospitality.fiu.edu/FoodSafety and share with us your innovative ways for managing food safety. Tell us what works for you. If you have something in writing, such as an effective policy or procedure, you can copy and paste it in the box provided at the Web site. If you do not have a formal policy, you can just write down your ideas at the Web site.

After we receive your suggestions, we will compile all of the information and make it easily accessible for contributors to share those innovative food safety tips.

Along with employee recruitment and retention, food safety will be the major problem facing the restaurant industry over the next decade. While our research project will not be able to solve all the barriers to making the science of food safety practical and useful, it is at least a start. Through our Web site you can share with others your success stories so that we all may benefit.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors and management at Nation's Restaurant News.

Professor David Talty teaches at Florida International University's School of Hospitality Management. David Walczak, Ph.D., teaches in the General Education and Kitchen Management program at the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale.

COPYRIGHT 2002 Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
COPYRIGHT 2002 Gale Group

Sanitizing Portable Equipment

To properly clean and sanitize portable equipment you must have a sink with three separate compartments for cleaning, rinsing and sanitizing. There should be a separate area for scraping and rinsing food and debris into a garbage container or disposer before washing, and separate drain boards for clean and soiled items. To sanitize a piece of equipment, use the following procedure:

1. Clean and sanitize sinks and work surfaces.

2. Scrape and rinse food into garbage or disposal. Presoak items, such as silverware, as necessary.

3. In the first sink, immerse the equipment in a clean detergent solution at about 120 ˚F. Use a brush or a cloth to loosen and remove any remaining visible soil.

4. Rinse in the second sink using clear, clean water between 120 ˚F and 140 ˚F to remove all traces of food, debris and detergent.

5. Sanitize in the third sink by immersing items in hot water at 170 ˚F for 30 seconds or in a chemical sanitizing solution for 1 minute. Be sure to cover all surfaces of the equipment with hot water or the sanitizing solution and keep them in contact with it for the appropriate amount of time.

6. If soapsuds disappear in the first compartment or remain in the second, if the water temperature cools, or if water in any compartment becomes dirty and cloudy, empty the compartment and refill it.

7. Air-dry. Wiping can recontaminate equipment and can remove the sanitizing solution from the surfaces before it has finished working.

8. Make certain all equipment is dry before putting it into storage; moisture can foster bacterial growth.

Sanitizing Continued...

Containers in serving situations such as salad bars, delis and cafeteria lines that hold ready-to-eat, potentially hazardous foods that are intermittently combined with additional supplies of the same food must have the containers cleaned at least every 24 hours.
Equipment used for storage of packaged or unpackaged food, such as a reach-in refrigerator, must be cleaned at a frequency necessary to eliminate the accumulation of soil residues. The cleaning schedule will be based on the following:

• The type of food involved.

• The amount of food residue accumulation.

• The temperature at which the food is maintained during the operation and the potential for the rapid and progressive multiplication of pathogenic or toxigenic microorganisms that are capable of causing food-borne disease.

In-use utensils can be stored in a container of water maintained at 60 ̊C (140 ̊F)
or more and the utensils and container are cleaned at least every 24 hours or at a frequency necessary to get rid of accumulated soil residues.

Utensils and equipment which come into contact with food that is not potentially
hazardous must be cleaned as follows:

• At any time when contamination may have occurred.

• At least every 24 hours for iced tea dispensers and self-service utensils such as tongs, scoops or ladles.

• Before restocking self-service equipment and utensils such as condiment dispensers and display containers.

Equipment such as ice bins and beverage dispensing machines must be cleaned at a frequency specified by the manufacturer. If there are no specifications, the items should be cleaned at a frequency necessary to avoid the accumulation of soil or mold.

Dear Customers

Like you, DayMark Safety Systems takes food safety very seriously. We all know that a single outbreak of foodborne illness can tarnish an establishment’s reputation, and in some cases, drive an establishment or company out of business. That’s why DayMark Safety Systems supports the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation’s (NRAEF) food safety awareness initiative.

September marks the twelfth annual National Food Safety Education Month®, (NFSEM) presented by the NRAEF’s International Food Safety Council. The theme of this year’s NFSEM is “Don’t Compromise – Clean and Sanitize.” DayMark Safety Systems will be taking part in this year’s awareness campaign and we encourage you to do so as well – by reinforcing food safety education and training programs related to this year’s theme.

To help you participate in NFSEM, an online Training & Promotion Guide is produced by the NRAEF’s International Food Safety Council. All weekly activities are based off of the NRAEF’s ServSafe® food safety training program. The Training & Promotion Guide is available free of charge on the NRAEF Web site at www.nraef.org/nfsem.

Industry, government and consumer organizations are working together to make National Food Safety Education Month 2006 a great success. With your involvement, we know that this year’s event will be the best ever. This is the restaurant and foodservice industry’s opportunity to reinforce what we do year-round to ensure safe food handling and to showcase our efforts to our customers and patrons. If you have any questions, need additional information please contact us at 1-800-847-0101 or contact the NRAEF at (312) 715-1010 ext. 374.

Cleaning and Sanitizing Equipment

Equipment, food-contact surfaces and utensils must be kept clean to sight and
touch. The food-contact surfaces of cooking equipment and pans shall be kept free of encrusted grease deposits and other soil accumulations. Nonfood-contact surfaces must be kept free of an accumulation of dust, dirt, food residue and other debris.
Heat or chemicals can be used to reduce the number of bacteria to acceptable
levels. They can also be used for certain other harmful microorganisms.Heat sanitizing involves exposing equipment to high heat for an adequate length of time. This may be done manually by immersing equipment in water maintained at a temperature of 170˚–195˚F for at least 30 seconds or in a dishwashing machine that washes at 150˚F and rinses at 180˚F.

For either method, it is important to check water temperature frequently. Thermometers and heat-sensitive tapes and labels are available for determining whether adequate sanitation temperatures have been achieved.

Chemical sanitizing can be accomplished by immersing an object in, or wiping it down with, bleach or sanitizing solution. For bleaching, use 1/2 ounce or 1 tablespoon of 5 percent bleach per gallon of water. For using commercial products, follow the manufacturers’ instructions.

Chemical sanitizers are regulated by the EPA, and manufacturers must follow strict labeling requirements regarding what concentrations to use, data on minimum effectiveness, and warnings of possible health hazards. Chemical test strips are available for testing the strength of the sanitizing solution. Because sanitizing agents become less effective as they kill bacteria and are exposed to air, it is
important to test the sanitizing solution frequently.

Equipment, food-contact surfaces and utensils must be cleaned:

• Before each use with a different type of raw animal food such as beef, fish, lamb, pork or poultry.

• Each time there is a change from working with raw foods to working with ready-to-eat foods.

• Between uses with raw fruits and vegetables and with potentially hazardous food.

• Before using a food thermometer.

• At any time during the operation when contamination may have occurred.