From meal prep to leftovers: Expert food safety tips for your Thanksgiving dinner

As the holidays approach and kitchens heat up, food safety becomes just as important as the meal itself.

In this short episode, we revisit timeless advice from University of Georgia Cooperative Extension food safety specialist Carla Schwan, an assistant professor in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, and Manpreet Singh, professor and former head of the Department of Food Science and Technology, now serving as an associate dean in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. Together, they share practical tips to help you cook, serve and store food safely this season.

From properly thawing your turkey to knowing when to finally pack up the leftovers, this episode will help you host with confidence and keep your guests healthy.

Resources:

• Food Safety Tips for Preparing a Holiday Turkey (UGA Cooperative Extension Publication)
• FDA major food allergens
• Find your county UGA Cooperative Extension office

Content from CAES:

• Healthy holidays: Food safety tips for gifts and gatherings
• Serving up the facts: Food science and safety

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Produced by Jordan Powers and Emily Cabrera
Edited by Jordan Powers and Emily Cabrera
Music and sound effects by Mason McClintock, an Athens-based singer, songwriter and storyteller. Listen to his music on Spotify. 

Get social with us!
Follow CAES on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn and check out UGA Extension on on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn for the latest updates.

Episode Transcript

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Jordan Powers (00:00):
Welcome to Cultivating Curiosity, where we
get down and dirty with theexperts on all the ways science
and agriculture touch our lives,from what we eat to how we live.
I'm Jordan Powers.

Emily Cabrera (00:12):
And I'm Emily Cabrera. We're from the
University of Georgia's Collegeof Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences.

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Jordan Powers (00:20):
As we enter the time of year where holiday
gatherings bring friends andfamily together, typically over
shared meals and potlucks, wedove into our archives to pull
out food safety advice to helpyou prepare for a safe season.

Emily Cabrera (00:32):
In this episode, you'll hear from Carla Schwan,
Assistant Professor andExtension Food Safety
Specialist, and Manpreet Singh,who was at the time of the
recording, Professor and Head ofthe CAES Department of Food
Science and Technology, and isnow Professor and Associate Dean
for Graduate Studies FacultyAffairs and Strategic
Initiatives for the college. Inthis short episode, Carla and

(00:54):
Manpreet provide simple yettimeless food safety advice from
preparing your meal to storingleftovers after the gathering
ends. So you feel more confidentgoing into this holiday season.

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Jordan Powers (01:08):
For anyone who's planning to host this season or
is preparing food to bring to agathering, Carla shares a few
simple steps people can take tokeep guests safe.

Carla Schwan (01:16):
There are several measures that we can take in
order to prevent foodborneillness and contamination. So
first, I would say, when you arepreparing your dish at home,
making sure the counters areclean, that you have cleaned
them, and you wash your hands,and you have a clean surface to
work with. And if you have rawmeats and raw vegetables
separating them, so havingseparate cutting boards, or if

(01:37):
you only have one cutting board,preparing the vegetable first
that is not going to be cooked.
So there is no intervention,really, to kill anything if it
was cross contaminated with themeat. So you prepare your
vegetable first, washing reallywell, your cutting board, and
then you prepare your meat thatis raw and is going to be
cooked. So there is anintervention step there to take
care of any bacteria if theywere present. So that's one
thing. And when you'retransporting your food to the

(01:59):
party that you're going toutilizing containers that will
keep your food either cold orhot. So if your food is cold,
you can use ice packs to makesure that it's padded around the
food and then transporting it tothe place that you are serving
it. Making sure that when youarrive to the party and you're
serving food, or if you'rehosting the party, you're
serving food, that you keep hotfoods hot and cold foods cold.

(02:20):
So for hot foods you want tokeep it above 140°F and for cold
foods you want to keep it below40°F. Being aware and making
sure that your guests are awareif you have any allergens. So
right now, FDA declares nine bigallergens, so we call the big
nine. And obviously that's forregulation purposes. Being in
your house, you're not going tobe regulated by the FDA. So you

(02:42):
don't necessarily have to do allthe guidelines that they offer.
But I highly encourage that ifyou have allergens, that you
make sure you tell people whatdishes have what allergens,
because the last thing you wantis somebody with an allergy
coming in and eating a food andthen having anaphylactic
reaction to it.

Jordan Powers (03:01):
To protect those with food allergies and other
food hypersensitivities, Carlasuggests labeling your dishes
and those that guests bring aswell. Especially if they contain
one of the Big Nine, which are,milk, eggs, fish, shellfish,
tree nuts, peanuts, wheat,soybeans and sesame. To help
prevent cross-contamination, shealso suggests using one serving

(03:23):
spoon per dish.

Carla Schwan (03:24):
So labeling your allergens, also hand washing,
having soap and paper towelsavailable for the guests to wash
their hands and hand sanitizersas well throughout this space.
Those are some tips when you arepreparing or bringing food or
serving food.

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Emily Cabrera (03:40):
I love how Carla's tips encourage being
clean and organized to helpensure everything goes off
without a hitch.

Jordan Powers (03:46):
Agreed. And while I feel like those tips address
the whole meal, I love that upnext Manpreet addresses the star
of the show on many Thanksgivingdinner tables, the turkey. There
is always trepidation around howlong to cook your bird. The
sweet spot seems elusive,because you definitely don't
want to undercook Turkey and runthe risk of serious foodborne
illness, but overcooking is alsoa faux pas. Manpreet provides a

(04:08):
simple and maybe obvioussolution.

Manpreet Singh (04:11):
Not just cooking foods until the juice is dry,
because I believe inthermometers. So if you cook a
product, and if you're going tocook it to a internal
temperature that is desired ofthe product. Have a thermometer
ready. Now, the second partbecomes using the thermometer
correctly. So there's so manylayers to this, but
understanding that you need tohave the tools not only produce

(04:31):
but to actually cook foodsafely, making sure the meat is
cooked properly.

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Emily Cabrera (04:38):
I appreciate that both Carla and Manpreet provide
easy, actionable advice. But nowI'm thinking about, before we
even get to the part where we'recooking the bird or any other
previously frozen meat, thereare a handful of safe thawing
methods and one really not safeway that I've shamefully been
guilty of doing for years.

Jordan Powers (04:59):
So common misconception might be that
thawing meat on the counter orin the sink is safe. But Carla,
who also reviews "Food SafetyTips for Preparing a Holiday
Turkey," a UGA CooperativeExtension Expert Resource,
details methods for safethawing, including refrigerator
thawing, cold water thawing andeven microwave thawing, not
counter thawing.

Emily Cabrera (05:20):
Exactly, lesson learned. We'll share the link to
that resource in the show notes.
It also provides tips for safecooking and safely storing
leftovers.

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Jordan Powers (05:31):
I know in our family, and I'm assuming many of
our listeners can agree that ata lot of these gatherings, food
is set out on tables so peoplecan graze throughout the day,
and even after the main course,people don't necessarily jump up
right away to sort leftovers incontainers and get them in the
fridge. So it was a bit of ashock to hear how fast bacteria
on food can multiply.

Manpreet Singh (05:51):
When you cook products or when you cook foods
at the house, there still couldbe certain bacteria which are a
lot more resistant to heat thanyour normal cooking
temperatures. There are bacteriawhich form spores, which are
hardier than normal vegetativecells. Now those spores, when
they're in warmer environments,can start germinating because

(06:11):
they were just heat shocked withall of the heat that you
provided to the food. So typicalexamples, or typical case of
this, is around Thanksgivingwith gravy type of products,
when you cook the product, youlet it sit out. It's warm. You
shock the spores, if there wasthose type of bacteria in the
food, and now those spores willstart to germinate, and the
bacteria starts to grow in it.
So that's where it startsgetting to be a little bit of a

(06:32):
food hazard or a dangeroussituation. Given ideal
conditions, within 20 minutes,the bacteria double itself. So
if there's ideal conditions andthere's decent number of
bacteria in there, high enoughnumber, you can imagine that
after three hours of sitting outon a counter, it could be pretty
intense.

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Emily Cabrera (06:56):
This was a really shocking revelation to me,
because I've always been underthe impression that food should
cool before we put it away. ButCarla also spoke to the
importance of getting leftoverspromptly stored in the fridge.

Jordan Powers (07:07):
And she also provided tips for when the party
is finally wrapping up and it'stime to put those leftovers
away, and even better, the nextday, when it's time to pull them
out and enjoy them all overagain.

Carla Schwan (07:17):
When the party is wrapping up and you have
leftovers, of course, you don'twant to waste food. So making
sure that you kind of keep atimeline on when that food was
put out. So usually we recommendthat if the food has been left
out for two hours or more, youshould throw it away. So that's
the general recommendation forstorage. And then, let's say
next day, or in the next twodays, you want to reheat that

(07:38):
food and you want to eat thatfood that was left over from the
party, making sure that you arereheating it to a safe
temperature, and using athermometer to make sure that
the internal temperature of thatfood has reached at least 165°F.

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Emily Cabrera (07:53):
Whether it's prepping for your meal or
storing leftovers, we hope thisepisode has helped you prepare
for the upcoming holiday seasonand beyond.

Jordan Powers (08:01):
As we mentioned, we'll be sure to put all of the
great resources we referenced inthe show notes. And if you still
have questions, always rememberyou can reach out to your local
Cooperative Extension agent foranswers. We'll include a link to
find your county Extensionoffice in the show notes as
well. We hope you all have awonderful and safe holiday
season.

Sound Effect (08:18):
[music]

Jordan Powers (08:19):
Thanks for listening to Cultivating
Curiosity, a podcast produced bythe UGA College of Agricultural
and Environmental Sciences. Aspecial thanks to Mason
McClintock for our music andsound effects. Find more
episodes wherever you get yourpodcasts.