The perfect place to swap germs. Food Safety News calls it the “Bacterial Buffet: All-You-Can-Eat Illness.” The reasons are different than you might think. Of course, we wonder if food safety regulations regarding food temperatures are upheld, but what, for instance, happens when a serving spoon gets dropped into the heap of food?
The entire platter must be discarded. Do you imagine that happens each time? Another issue involves the actual serving spoons. How many hands have touched that utensil before yours? Luckily, restaurants are required to change them every four hours, but still. Four hours is a long time for germs to spread.
The Soup Special Is Yesterday's Special
A bowl of soup on a chilly day might seem like a light meal that will really hit the spot. However, a sandwich or a salad might be more nutritious. A creamy bisque, chowder, or cream of broccoli contains more calories and fat than daily recommended and the chicken noodle serves up more sodium than you need in a week.
If that’s not discouraging enough, you should know that the soup specials are usually a concoction of the previous day’s meals left as scraps. Don’t order soup late in the day. That means it has been sitting in the pot all afternoon.
Sprouting Bacteria
Even though sprouts seem like one of the healthiest crunchies to add to a salad, here are a few things you might want to know. Since 1996, sprouts caused at least 30 outbreaks of food poisoning which resulted in new regulation protocols for bean sprouts. These new recommendations were instated in 1999.
Sprouts are cultivated in a warm, damp environment which is an ideal condition for harmful bacteria such as E. coli and Salmonella to propagate. Listeria is also a concern. Ordering cooked sprouts is one way to avoid the pathogens found on raw sprouts.
Is the House Salad the Best Value?
Contrary to common sense, the house salad, generally a small pile of greens and shaved carrots, is not the best choice if you’re looking for some bang for your buck. The mark-up on those inexpensive vegetables is exponential.
If the menu price is around $10, you can bet the restaurant paid no more than $2 to make it. So, go ahead and order one with some nutritional value like nuts, cheese, avocado, or other yummies. The house salad may be the least expensive salad option, but you’re getting the least as well.
The Second-Worst Salad Value
Besides the house salad, the next-least value on the salad menu is the wedge salad. This plate consists of a wedge-shaped slice of iceberg—the lettuce with zero nutritional qualities—drizzled in fattening bleu cheese, sprinkled with some chopped tomatoes, and, if you’re lucky, maybe topped with a spray of diced red onion.
Bacon bits, which may or may not be actual bacon, are a required topping. These inexpensive ingredients make the salad profitable for the eatery. But the markup is just as high as the house salad, so, go ahead, and choose something else.