Food Safety for All Ages

It's where cookies get baked and hamburgers get broiled. In many homes, the kitchen is a buzz of activity, and chances are your kids will want to join in.

"Kids are never too young to learn to be in the kitchen," said Melanie Barnard, author of 13 cookbooks, including "The American Medical Association Family Health Cookbook." "Children who participate in meal preparation and meal planning are not fussy eaters. If they participate in making the food, their curiosity will make them try it."

However, teaching kids to cook goes beyond reading recipes and showing them how to handle hot dishes and knives. Properly handling and cooking food to prevent the spread of foodborne bacteria is an equally important lesson, said Joan Aronson, a nutrition and sanitation instructor at New York Restaurant School She said most people don't know how common foodborne illness is because some symptoms - such as an upset stomach - can be mistaken for stress or nerves.

Here are a few tips on teaching your kids food safety.

1. Wash, Wash, Wash: In the kitchen especially, cleanliness is key, and can be broken into three parts.

Wash Your Hands: Experts agree that an important step to prevent the spread of bacteria in the kitchen is washing hands frequently. The ideal temperature for washing hands is between 110 and 120 degrees. Hands should be washed before and after handling any kind of food -- especially raw food. Barnard suggests hanging a large, colorful sign reading "Wash Your Hands" in a visible place, such as the refrigerator. Kate Heyhoe, author of "Cooking with Kids for Dummies," said hands should be washed thoroughly - including under fingernails and between fingers - with warm soapy water. She said one of the biggest mistakes by both parents and kids is not washing hands long enough. She suggested parents teach their children to wash for as long as it takes to recite the alphabet.

Wash Equipment: Utensils and cutting boards also must be washed frequently to avoid transferring harmful bacteria from one food to another. Again, 110 to 120 degrees is the ideal temperature. Aronson said it's especially important to wash a surface that has held raw food before using it to hold cooked food. As for the kind of utensils you and your young cooks should use, Aronson said, despite myths to the contrary, wooden cutting boards and tools aren’t more likely to retain bacteria than plastic items. In fact, she said, experts have found that bacteria growth is actually more likely on a hard plastic cutting board.

Wash Your Food: Vegetables should be washed and scrubbed, Heyhoe said, to rinse off pesticides that might have been used during growing. She said to remove the outer leaves of vegetables such as lettuce and cabbage, to get rid of the most exposed areas.

2. Heat It Up: Cooking food to the proper temperature is equally important in reducing the spread of bacteria. "You're not going to kill all the bacteria," Aronson said. "But we want to kill the harmful bacteria." She said opinions vary somewhat on the proper temperatures for different foods, but she recommends these guidelines:

Poultry - 165 degrees
Pork - 155 degrees
Ground meat - 155 degrees
Dairy and egg-based foods (such as quiche) - 145 degrees
Fish - 145 degrees

Heyhoe said parents should post recommended cooking temperatures in a prominent place, and get a food thermometer to teach children to check temperature. One frequently overlooked danger area is the tendency of kids to snack on raw cookie batter, which usually contains raw eggs. Uncooked eggs could carry salmonella, and ingesting them in raw cookie dough could lead to foodborne illness. Heyhoe said parents should either watch their children to make sure they don't eat the batter or used pasteurized eggs or egg products to reduce the chance of foodborne illness. Aronson said these products are used in processed foods such as cookie dough ice cream and egg nog and are usually safe.

3. Avoid the "Danger Zone": Teach kids to keep hot foods hot and cold foods cold. Heyhoe said hot foods should stay at least at 140 degrees and cold foods should be 40 degrees or less. Aronson calls the in-between area "the danger zone." She said the number of bacteria in food doubles every 15 to 20 minutes it is left at room temperature. In a clean plate of food, there can be up to 100,000 bacteria, she said. Leaving food out for a short period of time is fine, but if the bacteria count is allowed to climb into the millions or billions, the possibility of illness increases.

Following these guidelines should make your kitchen a happy - and healthy - place for you and your kids. Sharing the cooking experience should be positive. "It's important for parents and kids to get together in the kitchen," Heyhoe said. "It's a great way to do what you have to do and have time to catch up with your kids and find out how their day was."