Photo: Food and Drink/REX USA.
We know it's especially hard during the holidays, but watching what you eat may be more important than ever. According to the Food Standards Agency, there are around one million cases of food poisoning each year — mainly from a common bug found in uncooked poultry called Campylobacter. Of course, there's also shellfish (it's hard to forget a bad shrimp cocktail), those pesky greens and sprouts on the salad bar, and even raw eggs have a bad rap. But, one aggravator that may not be on your radar is cooked rice.
You may want to give that little white box another look, because it could contain heat-resistant Bacillus cereus. "It's not that rice itself is dangerous, but after it's been cooked there are spores of bacteria that can germinate," said Bob Martin, of the Food Standards Agency, to the BBC.
His advice? Try cooling the rice first if it is to be eaten later — and don't even think about a room-temp buffet. But, don't just take extra precautions with specific foods. If you really want to try to avoid food poisoning at all costs, make sure you're washing those hands, keeping your work surfaces clean and separate from one another, respecting use-by dates, monitoring your fridge temp, and eating leftovers within two days. Hopefully you don't have anymore Thanksgiving turkey rolling around. (BBC)