With the festive season rapidly approaching Cardiff Council Environmental Health Officers are issuing a reminder about the basic rules for safe storage, preparation and cooking of your turkey for a happy and germ free Christmas.
Studies show that food poisoning outbreaks are often poultry related and consumers are at risk unless they prepare and cook their turkey correctly.
Just by following these few simple rules, consumers can dramatically reduce their chances of contracting harmful food bugs. This advice applies not only to poultry such as turkey, chicken, duck and goose, but also game such as partridge or pheasant:
- Always leave frozen meat to defrost thoroughly at the bottom of a fridge or in a cool place. Raw meat must be kept below cooked or ready to eat foods to prevent contamination.
- Remember a large turkey can take a couple of days to thaw.
- Wash hands with hot water and soap before and after handling turkey, or any other raw meat.
- There’s no need to wash your turkey. Washing a turkey or any other poultry can splash harmful bacteria already on the bird around the kitchen leading to cross contamination of other foods. Thorough cooking will kill the bacteria present.
- Ideally, cook your stuffing separately, but if you feel you must stuff the bird, make sure you take the stuffing weight into account when calculating your cooking time.
- Carefully clean all cutting boards and utensils used to prepare raw poultry as these may be contaminated.
- Follow the cooking instructions carefully, ensure meat is thoroughly cooked (no longer pink) and any juices run clear.
- Cool leftovers quickly (less than 90 minutes) before refrigerating and only re-heat them once.
- If you reheat leftovers make sure they are piping hot throughout and don’t keep leftovers for more than 2 days.
Councillor Ed Bridges, Chair of Cardiff’s Public Protection Committee, said: “One of the joys of the festive period is cooking for the whole family, which often means cooking a much larger turkey than usual. By remembering to properly store, handle and cook your turkey, everyone can have a happy and healthy winter break.”
