Ideas for tool box training topics - food safety/hygiene basics

ours is a catering facility and we are planning to reinforce training by the tool box concept ; request your views/ advice on what would be the possible topics we could include.

Thanks

You could try a Glo Germ type of handwashing session, you can get the kits anywhere now.
http://www.glogerm.com/

Nothing like a visual reminder.

Regards,
Simon

We too had done a glogerm in the past, but I did something cooler. Having charge of the microlab and a little bit of "free" time for mischief, I did a couple of "experiments."

Over two days, I started the workday by washing my hands thoroughly, swabbing them and plating them. After several hours of a normal routine, working on the PC, doing maintenance in the lab (no actual product sampling, mind you) but *without* washing hands, I swabbed them again and plated them, then washed them thoroughly and plated that. On one occasion, I managed to sneeze into a swab and plated that for fun. Another two days, I repeated this "experiment" only this time when I washed my hands at the end of the day, I washed them according to the "mean" procedure I observed during GMP audits of handwashing practices.

Anecdotal and unscientific though they be, my results were along these lines (I'd have to dig in my files to find my presentation to be more specific):

All of my thorough hand washing (according to posted procedure) had excellent results, very few cfu. Working several hours without washing hands was horrendous, plate was covered in cfu. Most interesting to me was the "half" washing I had observed on GMP audits. "Half" washing my hands, oddly enough, yielded about half the cfu as not washing.

Note - before anyone becomes alarmed, I did not use the restroom during the experiment! I also got brave enough to plate for coliforms as well. Thankfully, 0 coliforms on all plates.

I took pictures of the plates and put together a small handwashing presentation that I think had a bigger impact than the glogerm exercise had. The people were aghast at the sneeze having fewer CFU than the plates from inadequate handwashing practices!