Thursday, June 26, 2008

Closet Foods

It’s time to come out of the closet about those secret food items that you consume on a regular basis. You don’t bring out these foods when company comes over. You don’t openly discuss your love of these foods. But you do eat them and you do love them.

One of mine is Chef Boyardee ravioli. Hot or cold, regular size or mini ravioli, out of the can or in a bowl – I love them. I’ve been eating Chef Boyardee since I was 10 years old.

My husband eats this concoction of Rice and Peas. It is White Rice, Peas, Butter and Soy Sauce. He’s been eating this since college. He makes it about once a week.

What is your closet food? Mac and Dogs – macaroni and cheese with cut up hot dogs? Sliced cucumbers dunked in ketchup? Watermelon with salt?

Yeah…You know what I’m talkin about.

Friday, June 13, 2008

Power Outage – When Does The Food Go Bad?

This weekend we had a windstorm that caused a power outage. The power outage lasted 24 hours in temperatures hovering near 90 degrees.

The first thing you become concerned about, other than the sweat rolling down your back, is how long do I have before my refrigerated and frozen food becomes spoiled.

Knowing that my refrigerated foods should be kept below 40 degrees I started to hunt for a thermometer. I found a Taylor probe thermometer that I have occasionally used when grilling out hamburgers and chicken breasts. Battery was dead.

Then I came across a battery operated, small, portable clock. The reason I’ve kept this clock around so long is it resets itself by the Atomic Clock which I think is pretty cool. But it also has a temperature readout on it. So I stuck it in the refrigerator. I reminded the kids for the 50th time to quit opening the refrigerator door. Yes I know the light does not come on – that’s because the electricity is out – NOW SHUT THE DOOR.

I checked back a couple hours later and the temperature inside the refrigerator is 67 degrees. Now as I seem to recall from a Food Manager Certification class that I took that this is not good. This food is no longer salvageable.

To make a long story longer….This became an opportunity to rid myself of all the tin foil wrapped mystery foods, the zip lock bagged chunks of freezer frost and other alien life forms that had been living in my refrigerator/freezer.

… the cats in the neighborhood… they were driven into a frenzy when the trash was set out Monday morning.

Monday, June 02, 2008

NRA ends with a bang…

Wow, what a great show. The last days at the NRA show were extremely productive. Headlining the booth was up and coming Chef Shea Gallante. Chef Shea was signing our new restaurant safety book, Kitchen Confessions. Chef Shea signed books for the attendees for several hours, taking time to meet and greet them all. From there the attendees poured into the DayMark® kitchen to see what was in store for them.

What they found were several fresh innovations that that we brought to the show. Many attendees stopped at our rolling deli rack to our Food Touch® Liner. Food Touch is a revolutionary new antimicrobial protected storage product that preserves the quality and extends the shelf life of perishable food items. In other words, it keeps food fresher longer. Many restaurant operators are faced with the issue of wasting food because bacteria growth, dehydration, and shrinkage. The antimicrobial protected product inhibits the bacterial growth in food to help increase shelf life.

The other innovative product that attendees ran into was the DayMark® timstrip. Timestrip is a new way to monitor food freshness. By squeezing the bubble on the back of the label and placing it on the container or wrapping, timestrip will monitor the time in 2, 3, 5 or 7 day increments. This will allow you to prevent illness by discarding food that is spoiled and monitor freshness of product in your cooler.

Check out our web space at www.daymarksafety.com to find out more details on our new innovations from the NRA show.