How To Store Food Safely?

Working mothers and working lady always go to markets or grocery stores during weekend to buy fresh meats, then placing them in the fridge right away thinking that the frozen area in the fridge is cold enough, long term placing wouldn’t be a problem. 

Make sure food has cooked down before put it in the fridge

Check Expiration Dates

In fact, frozen meats also have expiration dates and fresh meats, frozen meats and cooked meats all have its own particular expiration dates.

Product	Frozen (0 or below)	Thawed in Refrigerator
Raw Meats (beef, pork, veal, lamb)
Ground Meats	1 year	2 days
Roasts, Steaks, & Chops		3-5 days
Poultry (turkey, chicken)
Whole bird, cuts or pieces	1 year	2 days
Ground poultry	3 months
Fried/Breaded Chicken (nuggets, patties, pieces)
Fish & Seafood
Raw Lean Fish (tilapia, cod, catfish, trout, etc...)	1 year	2 days
Fatty Fish (salmon, tuna, sea bass, etc…)	3-6 months
Seafood
Cooked Fish		5-7 days
Processed Meats
Hot Dogs (unopened)	9 months	2 weeks
Lunch Meats	1-2 months	3-5 days
Ham (opened/unopened)	1-2 months/1 year	1 week/2 weeks
Bacon (opened/unopened)	2 months/6 months
Pepperoni, Salami	6 months	1 month
Sausage (raw/smoked)	6 months/9 months	2 days/1 week

Source: Meat Handling Document – Food Gatherers (02/03/14) www.foodgatheres.org

Once you missed the expiration date, the nutrients and freshness of the food will slowly fade its colour due to oxidation, even if it looks fresh on the outside, it’s rotten on the inside! For your family and your own health, you must know the correct ways to place meats.

Meat can be place into fresh meat and frozen meat

Storing Meat

Meats can be place into fresh meats and frozen meats in the supplied market. Fresh meats must be fresh and have elasticity, lean meat should be tender and bright red while fat meat should be white not yellowish or reddish. Frozen meat should be hard as ice, fat white, if it’s already defrost and not solid, then it’s not suitable for long term placement in the fridge. 

Place frozen meats on a plate or container before thawing them in the refrigerator 

Freeze The Meat Immediately 

Once home, you should separate long term and short term placement for frozen foods, short term placement foods should be place in a lower temperature in the normal storage while long term placement should be place in the frozen storage.

For fresh meats, slice them in cubes and place them in containers for convenience and speed up the frozen time to maintain the quality of the meats.

Fish cannot be stored as long as other animals meat

Freezing Fish

Remember when temperature haven't hit -30c, fishes are easily dehydrate and change its state, therefore fishes aren’t suitable for long term placement.

Tips: Wash fishes using EnviroHome Food Wash before storage, wash the outer part to clean away dirt and kill bacteria, then remove the gills and intestines. After cleaning, dry the fish and put some salt on it then only store it.

EnviroHome Cares For Your Life

EnviroHome Facebook

EnviroHome Official website

Vegetables You Should Never Eat

Vegetables bought from the market are normally rinse by water before eating. It can easily cause pesticides to be swallowed into our stomach, but some ways to wash vegetables aren’t that safe also, we can only help ourselves by taking care of our health.

Taking care of our health

Only if you know to use chemical free and natural products to wash your vegetables and fruits, otherwise you will have to avoid eating the following 3 vegetables.

 

Farmers will ignore the safety limits of pesticides to harvest the corps quicker than normal time

1. Rushing into harvest crops:

To avoid natural disaster to hit the crops, farmers will ignore the safety limits of pesticides to harvest the crops quicker than normal time. Other than that, don’t forget that we are used to buy loads of vegetables before any celebration to store and keep, therefore, farmers will have to follow the demands in the market and harvest the crops earlier than before.

 

 

There are environmental and health impacts to eat out of season produce

2. Out of season vegetables:

Expensive doesn’t always mean fresh! In season vegetables are cheaper and the nutrition value are also higher, instead out of season vegetables aren’t that good compare to in season vegetables because of the unnatural way of planting. Therefore, they need a huge amount of pesticides, chemical fertiliser and even ripening agent to grow.

 

Capsicums has a much higher percentage of pesticide 

3. Continuity harvest vegetables:

So called continuity harvest vegetables are from the same stem, the presence of non harvest seeds from opened flower and ripe seeds. Long beans, peas, four seasons beans and cucumber and others are this type of vegetables. They are harvest when ripe but most of the time are being sprayed with pesticides and even will happen immediate harvest after spraying pesticides situation, thats why they contain high risk of health problems.

 

 

Mix water with Food Wash to wash away the pesticides properly

Right way to wash vegetables: 

Pump chemical free and natural cleaning agent into the water, soak vegetables and fruits for 2 to 3 minutes, can’t be longer than 5 minutes otherwise the the nutrients will be loss. You can rub them during the soaking process then rinse them with water to let the pesticides to leave the vegetables and fruits.

EnviroHome Cares For Your Life

EnviroHome Facebook

EnviroHome Official website

Detox Your Body

Stop the haze

Lots of unsafe foods around makes us uncomfortable, we try our best to make it safe but forget about the poisonous substances flying around the air. Poison in foods or air, it’s not an easy task.

The air we breathe is often filled toxic and unwanted gasses

1.    Lung Detoxing

Lungs are the most easy organs to accumulate poisonous substance because the respiratory system is to move fresh air in and get waste gasses out of the body. An average of 8000g of air being breath into the lungs letting dusts, viruses to attack on them.

Detoxing: Cough up the poisonous gasses: Choose a confartable and clean space during the morning or after rain, raise your arms and take a deep breathe in (inhale), then coughing up mucus while you inhale deeply. At the same time, quickly place down your arms to let air to flow out your nose. Repeat it 10 times, breath normally in between.

Foods: black fungus, carrots, mushrooms, lilies

Exercise is always good for mental and physical health

2.  Liver Detoxing

Liver is the main poison-detoxifying organ in the body as it can breaks down virtually everything toxic to the body. Regarding to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), 11pm until 3am is an important time for liver to undergoes detoxification process. It is the best to remain asleep to help with detoxing. 

Detoxing: Exercise. Outdoor activities can increase body energy, immune energy and give pressure to the liver to detox, helping with the nervousness of organs and increase blood circulation.

Foods: carrots, grapes, onions, bitter

A glass of warm water after waking up will flush unwanted toxic out of your body

3. Kidney Detoxing

Kidney is the main organ to excrete waste, adjusting water, electrolyte and acid base balance. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) mention that 5am until 7am is the time period kidney to detox. Body going through a night of recovery, all the poison will concentrate in the kidney.

Detox: Drink a warm glass of water after wake up to cleanse your kidney and flush unwanted toxic out of your body.

Foods: cucumber, yam, cherry, melon

Increase fluid intake is a must for good health

4. Intestines Detoxing

The main job of large intestines is to remove water and salts from the undigested material and to form solid waste that can be excreted. However, as many as 20% people struggle with constipation, if it stays blocked up in your body, toxins and hormones have the chance the be re-absorbed back into the body rather than getting out of there.

Detoxing: Drink more water and up your fiber intake. More vegetables and fruits to keep your bowel movements healthy.

Foods: black fungus, bananas, apples, sweet potatoes, flax seed

EnviroHome Cares For Your Life

EnviroHome Facebook

EnviroHome Official website

Food Poisoning Prevention

We always assume that food poisoning always caused by carelessness of restaurants, however it can actually comes from our daily habits.

Food poisoning can be sever and even deadly for some individuals

Have you:

      1. Prepare meals in the morning, and place it on the table?
2. Store all sorts of food in the fridge?
3. Never washing all produces before you cut, cook or eat it?
4. Eat anything without washing your hand?

If you have two or more YES response to questions above, then you are increase the risk of food poisoning!

Wash hand before eating to prevent food poisoning

Wash Hand Properly

Snacking isn’t that big of a problem but not washing your hands before eating can easily transfer bacteria on your hands to the food. Personal hygiene is very important in food safety, you should wash your hand properly before or after preparation and eating.

Cooked food should be kept out of the danger zone

Store Cooked Foods In Fridge 

You may think that placed cook food on the table with a cover or container are totally safe. The fact is: Cooked food should not be left our of refrigeration for more than 1 hours. 

Regarding to United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the temperature range between 5'c to 60'c is known as Temperature Danger Zone where germs can grows most quickly and easily, and the food can become unsafe to eat.

Bacteria multiply by split in two. Under the right condition their double their number every 10 to 30 minutes, means that we would have over 2 million bacteria in 7 hours if we let cooked food sit at room temperature!  

Refrigerator is one of the important equipment to keep foods safe

Keep Your Food At Appropriate Temperature
Chilling foods at the right temperature is a must. To ensure that you refrigerator is doing its job, you should keep your refrigerator at 5'C and below and your freezer should operate at a temperature of -18'C.  

Besides, you can take additional steps to make sure your refrigerated foods stay as safe as possible:
a. Do not overloading
b. Clean the refrigerator regularly
c. Store refrigerated foods in covered container
d. Do not clutter up the refrigerator. Leave space in the fridge for perishable foods
e. Check expiration dates on foods

Wash fruits and vegetables before you eat

Washing Fresh Produce

No matter its organic or none organic, wash the fruits and vegetables before cut or cook is a must! Even you peel the skins off before eating, you still have to wash them to ensure they are clean and safe to eat. 

Soil can sometimes carry harmful bacteria. Plus, most of the produces contain pesticides residue. We advice you to wash the fruits and vegetables with clean water and EnviroHome Food Wash to remove pesticides, wax, insecticides, bacteria, preservatives and soil.

EnviroHome Cares For Your Life

EnviroHome Facebook

EnviroHome Official website

The Dirty Truth

Do you know that chopping vegetables on chop boards are dirtier than toilet seats? As a matter of fact, the truth are always hurtful, the kitchen is the dirtiest place in the house.

Kitchen is dirtier than toilet

Toilet seats aren’t that dirty

University of Arizona has done some research about bacteria on excrete objects and found out that toilet seats aren’t the dirtiest thing in a household. 

Research states that every square inches has approximately 50 types of bacteria on a toilet seat, a chopping board has 3 times the number of a toilet seat, a cloth has 6 thousands types of bacteria every square inches, a kitchen basin has 3 times the number of a toilet seat, but this isn’t as scary as you think.

Kitchen Sponge has 200 times more bacteria than toilet seat

You must know that a sponge has approximately 10 million types of bacteria every square inches making it placing at the highest rank as it has 200 times more than toilet seat! Normally a sponge is for doing the dishes, logically it should be the cleanest but it isn’t.

不当的处理食材方式令厨房变细菌温床

Why fecal bacteria will appear in the kitchen?

Excrement won’t be locate in the kitchen but fresh meats or intestines will have fecal bacteria.

Use one chopping board for meat and another one for vegetables

Chopping board

When preparing ingredients, we normally will forget about separating the equipment for raw and cooked foods. For convenience, chopping boards will be reuse after preparing raw ingredients for cooked ingredients, that is why bacteria will stay on the chopping board.

Tips: Use to chopping boards each for raw ingredients and cooked ingredients to avoid bacteria staining. Use a sponge to scrub it clean and air dry after used.

Replace kitchen sponge regularly

Sponge

Being the dirtiest object in the household, sponge has the most bacteria due to long term staying in a wet state. That is why things that has been touched by it will leave behind bacteria.

Tips: After using the sponge to scrub a chopping board that has been used to chop fresh meat, immediately wash the sponge once more and let it air dry.

Put the sponge in boiling water once every week to kill bacteria. If the sponge has change colour or has holes with mold, it means the sponge has been used for too long, change a new one immediately.

Kitchen sink provide an excellent environment for bacteria growth

Kitchen sink

Some people like to put fresh meats under the tap to rinse. This not only won’t kill bacteria but the flowing water will spread the bacteria.

Tips: Place the fresh meat in a bowl and use cold water with natural ingredients cleaning agent to go through the process.

EnviroHome Cares For Your Life

EnviroHome Facebook

EnviroHome Official website