How to stay away from these food poisoning causes

It’s sometimes called the invisible threat. Why?

Because the last thing you ate isn’t always what makes you sick. Food poisoning sends more than 120,000 people to the hospital each year. Symptoms can show up from 20 minutes to 6 days after eating the problem food.

With the holidays upon us, you might be spending more time in the kitchen cooking and baking. The best way to avoid food poisoning? Wash hands and surfaces often. Keep hot foods hot and cold foods cold. And be aware of some of the foods that have the potential to cause food poisoning:

Raw milk

Raw milk is milk from animals that hasn’t been heated — or pasteurized — to kill bacteria. It’s one of the most dangerous sources of foodborne illnesses — and is illegal in some states. Raw milk can harbor E. coli, listeria, campylobacter and salmonella.

The solution:

Always check your milk container to make sure it’s pasteurized, especially at farmers markets.

Raw milk cheeses

Eating soft cheeses made with raw milk is much riskier than eating pasteurized cheeses. Be cautious of queso fresco, feta, brie, Camembert and blue-veined varieties such as Roquefort.

The solution:

Eat only pasteurized cheeses.

Eggs

Chickens can pass salmonella to eggs before the shell forms, and salmonella-tainted eggs cause 79,000 cases of food poisoning and 30 deaths every year.

The solution:

Refrigerate eggs at or below 40° F. If products or recipes call for uncooked eggs, use pasteurized eggs (which are hard to find) — or avoid those recipes. (Or, see if the recipe allows for the use of a pasteurized egg substitute product instead.) And as oddly delicious as raw cookie dough is to some of us, don’t eat it or anything containing raw eggs — cookie dough, cake batter, etc.

Flour

Cookie dough and cake batter are often the culprits here, too. It’s rare, but raw flour can be contaminated with E. coli during harvesting, grinding and sifting. Bleaching flour won’t kill E. coli. Boxed cake mixes and prepared cookie dough can also harbor the germs.

The solution:

Sometimes licking the batter off the spatula is as good as the final product, but to lower your risk of food poisoning, don’t sample cookie dough, cake batter, brownie batter, etc.

Bagged lettuce

It’s convenient, but bagged lettuce can be another source of food poisoning. Some outbreaks are tied to a specific kind of greens (sometimes romaine lettuce or spinach), or to certain growers or packers. Salmonella and other bacteria can be traced to dirty irrigation water, soil or human hands. Germs can multiply in the juice from cut leaves, and can get trapped inside the bags. They can also cling to the leaves even after washing.

The (possible) solution:

Consider buying whole head lettuce. Although there’s no guarantee that whole heads of unwashed lettuce have lower bacteria levels than packaged greens, their inner leaves aren’t exposed to as many sources of contamination, and are not handled as much as greens that are bagged, which further reduces the opportunities for contamination.

Chicken

Americans love their chicken, but about a million get sick from eating it every year. Like all animals, chickens have bacteria in their gut, which can get on the meat during processing and packaging.

The solution:

Don’t wash raw chicken because it can contaminate your kitchen utensils and cutting boards. Thoroughly cooking chicken to 165° F kills the bacteria.

Raw oysters

Many enjoy eating oysters right out of the shell. But oysters trap viruses and bacteria through their gills.

The solution:

The only safe way to enjoy oysters is to cook them.

Ground beef

E. coli is the culprit here.

The solution:

Cook steaks and roasts to 145° F on the inside; ground beef and pork need to reach 160° F to be safe to eat.