Food Safety Matters

Food Safety … It isn’t something most people think about on a daily basis, except for the restaurant industry that is.  We think about it everyday because the last thing any of us want is for someone to get sick from the food that we work hard to prepare.  We also don’t want to think about our restaurant being shut down because we didn’t meet food safety standards.

Food Safety Guidelines

With the right equipment and the right knowledge, food safety is a pretty easy thing to handle.

Some great guidelines to remember are:

-  All restaurant employee employees should follow hygiene guidelines; such as washing hands after using the restroom and before preparing food.

-  Cross-contamination of foods should be avoided at all times.  Wash, rinse and sanitize all food contact surfaces, such as work tables, slicers, and other preparation equipment.

-  Foods must be cooked to recommended internal temperatures.

-  Hot foods should be held hot at temperatures of 140 degrees Fahrenheit or greater.  Holding cabinets provide a constant source of proper heat.

-  Cold foods should be kept cold at temperatures of 41 degrees Fahrenheit or lower.  Keep a thermometer in your refrigerator to make sure the temperature is at the proper setting.

-  Abusing standard time and temperature standards for food should be avoided at all costs when handling prepared foods.

-  Leftovers should only be reheated in the oven once; after that they should be tossed out.

Food Safety Means Better Health

As stated earlier in the post, food safety matters to everyone … restaurateur, chef, employees, and patrons can all be harmed by foodborne pathogens.  There are more than 250 known foodborne diseases that cause anywhere from minor illness to death.  By following the simple guidelines listed above and by making sure all of your equipment is functioning properly, you can help prevent disease and illness caused by unhealthy foods.

Ice Machine Slime Is An Important Maintenance Issue

Ice machine owners may be getting slimed without knowing it.

Ice machine slime is more than a funny-sounding phrase that evokes fond memories of watching Bill Murray in Ghostbusters at the matinee. For restaurant equipment owners, ice machine slime is a real health hazard that can run a kitchen afoul of the health inspector and possibly shut down a thriving foodservice business.

The Gory Details on Ice Machine Slime

Ice machine slime is such a prevalent hazard that muckraking Houston newsman Marvin Zindler made the sentence “Slime in the ice machine!” a household phrase along the Texas coastline. Ice machine slime isn’t deadly to healthy adults, but still, it can be harmful. It also has a distinctive taste and smell, and can be visually disgusting to your customers. Here’s what the City of Houston says:

It is a type of mold or fungus that accumulates from bacterial growth on surfaces that are constantly exposed to clinging water droplets and warm temperatures. Water residuals may be present on these surfaces due to machine construction or the presence of scouring utensils such as steel wool or scouring pads. If the residuals are left exposed and not wiped clean or the machine is not sanitized regularly, you will then see bacteria and mold growths in the moist, cool environment of your ice machine. Most times, slime will take on a pinkish tone; if left untreated, the pink will turn to red, green, brown and even black ropes of slime hanging from the freezer panels inside the machine after a while. Pretty picture, isn’t it?

Green and pink ropes of slime hanging in your ice machine and dropping in customers’ drinks… it may not be fatal, but it could soon be sending your once-healthy clients to the lab for some health tests.

The Ice Machine Slime Answer

If for example you’ve got ice machine slime in your favorite Manitowoc ice machine model SD-0852A, how do you handle the problem?

The Houston health inspectors recommend using quarternary ammonium (QAC), which kills the mold/fungus and also inhibits additional growth for a period of time after the slime has been removed. This chemical won’t react with the stainless steel of your SD-0852A, and it’s also handy for keeping slime out of other restaurant equipment like your soda machine or the nozzles and hoses of your direct draw systems.

For other ice machine buying tips and maintenance advice, check out our ice machine buyers guide!

New Pizza World Record

Big Apple Pizza & Pasta in Fort Pierce, Florida is looking to break the longest pizza line world record. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the current record is held by the Tiziano Shopping Centre Tenant’s Union in Treviso, Italy. They had a line that was 611 feet 2 inches long back in October 28, 2006. Big Apple Pizza & Pasta owner Scott VanDuzer says that he will be able to make a line more than 700 feet long.

I wonder what kind of pizza oven he is using for baking all those pizzas.

Other Pizza World Records

Aside from the World’s Longest Pizza line record, there are a few other world records involving pizza that we feel are worth mentioning. There is the Fastest Time to Eat a 12” Pizza, which is held by Tom Waes from Ghent, Belgium. Tom ate a pizza in 2 minutes and 19.91 seconds on December 2nd, 2006. Then there is the World’s Record for largest pizza order set by Papa John’s on June 8, 2007.

Fifteen San Diego area Papa John’s Pizza stores delivered 13,500 pizzas at exactly 11:00 am to the same destination, General Dynamics NASSCO shipyard. The pizzas were a reward to the crew there for the completion of the Navy’s newest dry cargo/ammunition ship, the USNS Lewis and Clark.

Pizza World Records Require Pizza Ovens

We were thinking that the only way that a restaurant could break a world record is if they had the proper equipment. So, if you are planning on attempting your own pizza record, give one of our representatives a call and we can help you pick out the proper pizza oven. We have a large selection of sizes and brands, including Baker’s Pride, Garland and Montague, so there is sure to be one just right for your shop.

Do you think there is a world record for number of pizza ovens carried by one restaurant equipment company?

The history of Ice Cream

There are many different stories that tell the tale of the origins of ice cream. Some say it began in 400 B.C. with the Persians. Others say that ice cream got its start in 62 A.D. with the Roman Emperor Nero who brought snow down from the mountains and mixed it with nuts and honey. The first documented American appearance of ice cream was in 1700 when Governor Bladen of Maryland served it to his guests. The first ice cream parlor opened its doors in New York City in 1776. Dolly Madison is even rumored to have served ice cream as dessert in the White House for her husband’s second inauguration in 1812.

Ice Cream: How It’s Made

Today, ice cream is made several ways, but most Americans still enjoy the flavor of homemade ice cream made in a hand-cranked freezer. These freezers use ice mixed with salt to keep the temperature of the ice cream ingredients cold and under control. Fortunately, you can also buy ice cream makers that have electronic cranks so you don’t wear yourself out making it. Then again, that is a great way to burn off calories before enjoying the ice cream.

Ice Cream for When It’s Hot Outside

If you happen to be lucky enough to run a restaurant that serves ice cream, than you are sure to see some smiling faces when it is hot outside and it is dessert time. The best way to store all those wonderful flavors is a spot freezer. They allow restaurant staff and chefs to see and locate ingredients, as well as making it easy to serve. Spot freezers easily go under countertops and behind bars, making them very easy to fit into your kitchen space.

Short Order carries True spot freezers and Beverage-Air spot freezers, as well as the rest of your kitchen equipment needs.

Green Restaurants Are Here to Stay

Green restaurants are sprouting up all over the place, as they should be. Restaurant patrons have a growing daily concern for the health of their environment and the health of their families. They are making their homes, apartments, offices, cars and lives more green; why wouldn’t they want their favorite dining spot to do the same thing. Fortunately for commercial kitchens everywhere, restaurant equipment manufacturers are helping out.

Green Restaurant Equipment

The Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy have united to form the Energy Star movement. Currently, five categories of commercial restaurant equipment have established Energy Star guidelines. They are fryers, hot food holding cabinets, refrigerators/freezers, dishwashers, and steam cookers. These certified units can save over 40% in energy costs compared to non-Energy Star models.

Some examples of Energy Star rated equipment are the Vulcan VPX3 Counter Boilerless/Connectionless Electric Steamer, the Hobart LXi Undercounter High Temp Dishwasher, and the Frymaster H55 High-Efficieny Gas Fryer.

We care about the environment at ShortOrder.com; so if you have questions about Energy Star rated equipment that we carry, just give us a shout and we will be happy to help.

Green Restaurant Tips

You don’t need to buy all new equipment at one time to become a greener restaurant. There are several other things that you can do to start you down the green path.

• You can use low-flow pre-rinse spray nozzles at the dish machines.
• Use compact fluorescent lamps instead of light bulbs in break rooms, storage rooms, offices, walk-in refrigerators, etc.
• Use take-out containers that can be recycled (#1 and #2 plastics and aluminum) instead of Styrofoam.
• Use organic foods in the kitchen.
• Make sure to use recycled paper products whenever possible (i.e. napkins, office paper, menus)
• Install occupancy sensors in the restrooms, storage rooms and any other low-traffic rooms. Lights will turn off automatically when the rooms are unoccupied.

Here’s to greener restaurants and a greener future!

Char Broil Burgers for a Taste of Summer

The temperatures are starting to rise, the sun seems to be shining more, and everyone’s thoughts of food are turning to the wonderful taste of a char broil burger. You know, char broil, that smoky, and grilled to perfection with the intricate pattern of grill marks way of cooking that only comes from a steel cooking surface over an open-flame. If you are like me, once that warm weather hits and summer is well on its way, this is the only way you want to enjoy your burger.

Char Broil Burgers for Better Tate

Charbroiling is actually one of the best ways to cook meats, be it chicken, steak or pork, to well-done or somewhere near there. Charbroiling enables the grill master to maintain the speed at which the meat is cooked, as well as the tenderness. Meats cooked on a char broiler also come off the grill perfectly moist and never dried out.

Char Broil Burgers Indoors for Outdoor Flavor

Restaurants are able to bring the outdoors inside by having a Char broil grill in their kitchen. There are several considerations a restaurant should take into consideration before purchasing this restaurant equipment appliance. Shortorder.com offers a char broiler buyers guide that includes an explanation and comparison of the three main types of char broilers: char rocks, lava rocks and radiant heat.

Tips for the Perfect Char Broil Burgers

The following tips will assist your restaurant staff in making the best Charbroiled burgers they can on your char broil grill.

1) Use the appropriate grate for the menu item.

2) Season the grates before the first use by preheating them to open the pores and brushing them with oil.

3) Pre-heat the grates before cooking to help reduce sticking.

4) Dip food in seasoned oil before grilling to reduce sticking and to enhance flavor.

5) Consider positioning grates on an angle for charbroiling. It will drain the grease better and gives you better control of heat distribution. Well done items go toward the top to cook slowly and thoroughly. Rare items go toward the lower position to cook rapidly on the outside and leave the inside rare.

6) Wire brush the grates after each use or batch of food product.

The International Pizza Expo Sports More Games Than Just Pizza Spinning

Pizza Expo attendees may be unaware, but the World Pizza Games that wrapped yesterday aren’t the only games at the International Pizza Expo. According to the Pizza Expo website, there are sixteen entertainment/game companies here at the show, including videogame heavyweight Namco.

The heydays of the video game arcade are long gone, and kids no longer hoard quarters for afternoons playing Defender and Dragon’s Lair. However, many pizza expo attendees would argue that no pizzeria is complete without a few arcade games. That’s certainly what you’d hear if you went by booth 1095 today - the booth of the American Amusement Machine Association.

International Pizza Expo Highlights from Thursday

Today also featured the International Pizza Challenge and Pizza Festiva finals (including the crowning of the 2008 Pizza of the Year) and the $20,000 MEGA BUCKS Giveaway drawing. It’s crazy that the International Pizza Expo - already a great event - can top it all off by giving away $20K to one lucky pizza expo attendee, but that’s exactly how the expo ended this year.

Time to Go Home and Recover from the Pizza Expo

So we’re putting the wraps on the 2008 International Pizza Expo. With joy in our hearts, fresh business cards in our pockets and the glorious aftertaste of primo Italian pie on our lips, we’re headed back home to the quality restaurant equipment that we love. And our families, of course, whom we love too.

Hopefully you saw us at the pizza expo and had a chance to meet us face to face. If not, well, heck, drop us a line to meet one of our restaurant equipment specialists. We’d love to chat with you about your pizzaria needs. We’ve got it all, from Eagle pizza dough racks to five-star Montague pizza ovens to Editor’s Choice Beverage-Air pizza prep tables.

Pizza Convention-eers and Folks at Home Should Enjoy This Video

This pizza convention is madness! People love their pizza as much as we love top-notch restaurant equipment like this Bakers Pride pizza oven. It’s a pizza chef’s best friend, as well as a 5-star Editor’s Choice at our website.

And here’s a prime example of the pizza convention madness.

We found video of the World Pizza Games (from the 2007 pizza convention) on YouTube. Watch and digest, preferably with a piping slice in your hands!

News Bites from the 2008 International Pizza Expo Convention in Las Vegas

Las Vegas Pizza Central, April 1, 2008 - A pizza convention? Yup, that’s where we’re at, a pizza convention! And not just any pizza convention, but the 2008 International Pizza Expo, the “largest pizza show in the world”! We’re here representing our restaurant equipment, especially our pizza-related products like Vulcan ovens, Beverage-Air pizza prep tables and Hobart mixers. It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.

Here at the Las Vegas Convention Center, it’s all about the ubiquitous Italian pie that’s known worldwide. Today is day one of the pizza convention, a massive collection of pizza talents and pizza products with 450 exhibiting companies (restaurant equipment retailers, restaurant marketing companies, and many national and local restaurants) 1000 exhibits, 60 educational sessions, Italian Chef Wars and the Pizza of the Year throwdown (part of Pizza Festiva). We’re seeing plenty of laughs, lots of friendly chatter and business cards flying from wallet to purse to wallet like a pizza-themed paper snowstorm.

Pizza Convention Games

Another big attraction at the pizza convention are the ever-popular World Pizza Games. When you gather thousands of pizza-making professionals in one giant Las Vegas convention hall, what better than to pit the best against the best to see who can earn bragging rights for his or her restaurant or kitchen?

The pizza convention’s games are being organized by the World Pizza Champions, Pizza Today, Pizza Expo and Tony Gemignani, a six-time World Pizza Acrobat. The convention games are four in number:

• Freestyle Acrobatic Dough Tossing
• Fastest Pizza
• Largest Dough Stretch
• Team Acrobatics

Each winner of a pizza convention game wins $1000, with lesser awards for second and third place in each category.

Register to Win a Custom Hobart Mixer!

One of our favorite manufacturers, Hobart, is giving away a custom-painted “hot rod” Hobart mixer at their pizza convention booth (#4105). The Hobart mixer will be awarded on Thursday just before the $20000 MEGA BUCKS drawing. (Hobart is also the official sponsor of the World Pizza Games.)

If quality restaurant equipment stirs your blood like it does ours, you don’t want to miss out on your chance at this incredible piece of pizza-making gear. If you’re at the pizza convention, get on down to the Hobart booth!

Visit Short Order, the Home of Brand-Name Restaurant Equipment!

If you’re a restaurant equipment buyer or kitchen manager, come by the Short Order booth, number 8033, and say hi! We’re at the pizza convention, eatin’ it all up!

Manitowoc, WI, Is a Town of 35,000 People Who Can Go with the Flow

Manitowoc ice machines used to be all we knew about Manitowoc. In fact, we didn’t even know that Manitowoc ice machines were built in a place called Manitowoc. Then we took the time to find out more about this small town in eastern Wisconsin. It’s not just the epicenter of the commercial ice machine world; it’s the pride of the Manitowoc River and the county seat of - you guessed it - Manitowoc County. Located in Brett Farve’s back pocket, just a half-hour from Green Bay, Manitowoc sits at the mouth of the Manitowoc River where it enters Lake Michigan.

Manitowoc History

Manitowoc’s humble origins date back to 1820 and the family of Matthew Stanley, the original settlers. Given its geographical advantages as a gateway to the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway, Manitowoc unsurprisingly has been closely tied to seafaring, trading, fishing and shipbuilding. During World War II, Manitowoc iced its share of the Axis military machine by building tankers, subs and landing craft.

Manitowoc Attractions

Today, this powerhouse of commercial icemaker manufacturing is the site of the Wisconsin Maritime Museum, one of the largest museums in the U.S. dedicated to ships and seafarers. Originally the Manitowoc Submarine Memorial Association, the museum is the current home of the mothballed WWII submarine Cobia and boasts over 60,000 square feet of displays. The quality and quantity of the Manitowoc museum’s efforts have been rewarded with Smithsonian Museum affiliation.

Other Manitowoc Features

For a small town that doesn’t even have its own TV station, Manitowoc is associated with a good number of fun features and facts:

• the mother house of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity is in Manitowoc.
• this city of some 35,000 residents also is home to about 23,000 Roman Catholics.
• Manitowoc has sent several favorite sons to the NFL, including Don Davey, Doug Free and Mike Lorenz.
• In the movie The Prince and Me, Julia Stiles plays a farm girl from Manitowoc, the ice machine mecca of the country.

And Manitowoc Ice Machines

Of course, on our little restaurant equipment blog, no mention of Manitowoc, WI, is going to pass without us pontificating a little about best-of-breed Manitowoc ice machines like the Manitowoc SY-0504, an easy-to-clean and typically reliable Manitowoc icemaker that generates 540 pounds of half-dice sized ice cubes every day. Manitowoc ice machines are made by the Manitowoc Foodservice Group, a three-division corporation that features the brands Manitowoc Ice, Kolpak, McCall, Hartford, Servend and Multiplex.

Needless to say, Manitowoc ice machines are pretty darned important to the small town of Manitowoc, WI. Without them - and the good people of Manitowoc who make them - our glasses would be a lot lonelier during long, hot, ice-cube-less summer nights.