cooking

You have a food thermometer and are ready to use it – that’s fantastic! But do you know where to place it in your foods? Correctly placing the food thermometer within food is important to get the most accurate temperature reading. Without proper placement, it’s possible that parts of your food could still be undercooked and, if contaminated, could make you sick.

Harvesting collard greens and making whole wheat crackers from scratch is not a typical day on the job for me as the Deputy Under Secretary of USDA’s Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services. But I can assure you it is the perfect recipe for a great day at work! Earlier this month, I had the chance to spend the morning at Watkins Elementary School in Washington, D.C. with Admiral Rachel Levine, Assistant Secretary for Health of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. There, we joined some incredible 5^th grade students during their FoodPrints class and witnessed first-hand the transformational power of nutrition education. And best of all—it was delicious!

A meal preparation study (PDF, 1.3 MB) from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) revealed that only 55% of people use a food thermometer to verify if their food is safe to consume, despite 88% of participants reporting that they own a thermometer. Instead, participants in the study relied on visual cues such as color, firmness and time. But are visual cues enough to prevent foodborne illness?