Managers and employees share in the responsibility to use safe food handling practices that reduce the potential for foodborne illness. The food code requires that there be a designated "person-in-charge" at the food establishment during all hours of operation. The person-in-charge shall be able to identify and take corrective action to eliminate high-risk practices that increase the potential for foodborne illness. When applicable, the person-in-charge of the retail establishment shall ensure the following:
- Retail food establishment operations are not conducted in a private home or in a room used as living or sleeping quarters.
- Persons unnecessary to the retail food establishment operation are not allowed in food preparation, food storage, or warewashing areas, except that brief visits and tours may be authorized by the person-in-charge if steps are taken to ensure that exposed food; clean equipment, utensils, and linens; and unwrapped single-service and single use articles are protected from contamination.
- Employees and other persons such as delivery and maintenance persons and pesticide applicators entering the food preparation, food storage, and warewashing areas comply with this rule.
- Employees are effectively cleaning their hands, by routinely monitoring the employees handwashing.
- Ill employees are restricted or excluded as appropriate.
- Employees are visibly observing foods as they are received to determine if they are from approved sources, delivered at the required temperatures, protected from contamination, unadulterated, and accurately presented, by routinely monitoring the employees' observations and periodically evaluating foods upon their receipt.
- Employees are properly cooking potentially hazardous food, being particularly careful in cooking those foods known to cause severe foodborne illness and death, such as eggs and comminuted meats, through daily oversight of employees' routine monitoring of the cooking temperatures using appropriate temperature measuring devices properly scaled and calibrated.
- Employees are using proper methods to rapidly cool potentially hazardous foods that are not held or not for consumption within (4) four hours, through daily oversight of the employees' routine monitoring of food temperatures during cooling.
- Consumers who order or are served raw or partially cooked foods of animal origin in a ready-to-eat form, are informed that the food is not cooked sufficiently to ensure its safety.
- Employees are properly sanitizing cleaned multiuse equipment and utensils before they are reused, through routine monitoring of solution temperature and exposed time for hot water sanitizing, and chemical concentration, pH, temperature, and exposure time for chemical sanitizing.
- Consumers are notified that clean tableware is to be used when they return to self-service areas such as salad bars and buffets.
- Employees are preventing contamination of ready-to-eat food from unwashed hands and are properly using suitable utensils such as deli tissue, single-use gloves, or dispensing equipment, when such items can be used.
- Employees are properly trained in food safety as it relates to their assigned duties.