Shari's Update - 1/2/22

​Best wishes to everyone for a healthy and happy New Year!! 
 
WCHI’s bingo will be held at Commitment to Family & Community, 165 Cherry St, Coplay on Sunday, January 9th.  Doors open at 1 pm.  Call Liz for more details 484-274-6687.
 
Our Food Pantry distribution will be on Thursday, January 13th at St John the Baptist Church parking lot, 3024 S Ruch St, Whitehall 11am-1pm and 5:30-7:00pm. For more info call 484-225-0358.
 
We are in need of 12oz cereal boxes and instant oatmeal with 8-10 packets for next week’s Food Pantry distribution.  All Donations are appreciated and may be shipped or dropped off to my office, Re/Max Unlimited Real Estate, 1080 Schadt Ave, Whitehall, PA 18052.   Please leave your donations inside the foyer on the right, Monday through Friday 9AM- 5PM, Saturday 9AM-1PM & Sunday 10AM-1PM  THANK YOU!!!
 
This is a great time of year to host a Food and/or Toiletry Drive for WCHI.  Food and toiletries should be placed in separate boxes.  We are always in need of toiletries: toilet paper, tissues, soap, deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, feminine napkins, baby and adult diapers.  Food items include: all kinds of soup, pancake syrup, an jelly.  Our website should be updated later this week with other needed items https://tinyurl.com/WCHIPantryList   If you decide to do a drive, please let us know at https://tinyurl.com/WCHIdrive   WCHI would like to promote your drive on Facebook.
 
Please note: WCHI does not accept any refrigerated, frozen, or homemade items from the public for liability reasons.  All our refrigerated and frozen foods are temperature controlled and come directly from Second Harvest Food Bank. 
 
The Federal and State government have specific rules for Food Safety.  WCHI is required to have a ServSafe Certification to be a member of Second Harvest.  Several volunteers do have this certification, which needs to be renewed every five years.  I will share some basic tips that everyone should know about when handling food at home to prevent foodborne illnesses, which can cause sickness and death.  Some of this information comes from the 7th Edition of SERVSAFE Manager book.
 
There are four main risk factors that cause food to become unsafe:
 

1. Food has suffered Time-Temperature abuse.  This can be from thawing frozen food improperly (like sitting on a kitchen countertop for hours instead of being placed in a refrigerator) or not cooking food to the required internal temperatures to kill pathogens that make people sick.  It is good to purchase a food thermometer to make sure the following food items meet these internal cooking temperatures degree Fahrenheit:  seafood 145; whole cuts of beef and pork 145, ground beef and ground fish 155, whole and ground poultry 165.  Also, these uncooked food items should also be placed in the same shelf order in your refrigerator or freezer to prevent food contamination if any of the uncooked juice spills onto another food product.  Bread should always be on the top and chicken should always be on the bottom.

 
2.    Cross contamination – This occurs when pathogens transfers from one food surface to another. This can happen when ready to eat food touches contaminated food surfaces -like an apple touches an unwashed cutting board that just had raw chicken on it. Or a contaminated wiping cloth touches the apple.
 

1. Poor personal hygiene – include failing to wash hands often and correctly, sneezing and coughing on food, and head or arm scratching and then touching food.

 
4.    Poor cleaning and sanitizing – happens when equipment and utensils are not washed, rinsed and sanitized between uses.
 
I hope you found these risk factors informative.