How students can avoid food fails this semester

Being away from home for the first time and cooking for yourself can be a daunting experience and we’ve all heard the stories of students cooking pasta in a kettle, eating food past its use-by date or setting off a smoke alarm or two!

But, eating safe and healthy food while at university or college doesn’t have to be complicated. Food Standards Scotland, the public sector food body, has put together the below guide to ensure you avoid any food fails this semester.

Cleanliness

Keeping the kitchen clean will help food preparation to be hygienic and make cooking a bit easier. Cleaning kitchen surfaces, dishes and utensils as you use them will help prevent the growth of harmful bacteria spreading onto food.

Effective hand washing and regularly washing cloths and tea towels are also important.

Make sure to follow these rules:

always wash hands and worktops before preparing food,
always wash worktops and utensils thoroughly in hot, soapy water after they have been in contact with raw meat, including poultry or raw eggs,
never put ready-to-eat food, such as salad, bread or fruit, on a worktop or chopping board that has been in contact with raw meat or poultry unless you have washed it thoroughly first.

Planning meals and food shopping

Eating healthier meals could be tricky if you don’t make a plan - before going shopping, think about some meals for the week ahead.

Checking use-by dates as you shop helps you to know when food needs to be eaten by and can help avoid food poisoning. Planning your meals can also help to make sure you have healthier meals while reducing food waste.

Before going shopping, think about some meals for the week ahead;

check what food you have already in your fridge and freezer and make a list for what you need, and
take a list with you when you shop so you can keep track of what you need and don’t end up buying too much that might not fit in the fridge,
keep in mind any food with an approaching use-by date and try to use that up first.

Always check the food label

It’s important to always look for the instructions on food packaging when storing and cooking food. Try to remember:

food labels include the use-by date (for perishable foods such as sliced ham), so read labels carefully to ensure you are storing food correctly and eating or freezing it before it goes off,
the only way to tell if food is safe to eat is to use the use-by date,
use-by dates are for ensuring safety and best-before dates are for ensuring quality,
when shopping, look for foods that have longer dates so you know you won’t waste the food,
remember to follow all storage and cooking instructions on the food labels, including how long to eat a product once it’s opened,
Packaged foods also have nutritional labelling on the back, choosing a healthier option usually means choosing products which are lower in fat, saturated fat, salt and sugars.

Basing meals on starchy foods

Starchy foods such as different breads, pasta, rice and potatoes, noodles, tapioca, plantain and sorghum are an important part of a healthy balanced diet;

these foods should make up just over a third of all the food that you eat,
they are an important source of energy and a good source of a range of nutrients in our diet such as fibre, vitamins, calcium and iron,
choosing wholegrain varieties of these starchy foods can provide more fibre, which helps you feel fuller for longer,
starchy foods are usually cheap, often available on multi-buy offers, are long-lasting and are generally easy to store in your room or your part of the cupboard.

Leftovers

If you’ve cooked food that you aren’t going to eat straight away, cool it as quickly as possible and store your leftovers in the fridge to eat the next day.

Batch cooking meals if you have a freezer is a great way to store food for later and minimise food waste.

To help prevent food poisoning, just make sure you;

cool food within 2 hours and then store it in the fridge,
don’t keep it for longer than 2 days and only reheat once, and
make sure any reheated leftovers are steaming hot throughout to kill any bacteria that might cause food poisoning.

Fridge storage

There’s a few things you need to be careful of when storing food in your fridge;

keep raw meat and ready-to-eat foods on separate shelves in the fridge, or in clean, sealed containers if separate shelves cannot be used in a shared fridge,
store raw meat, poultry or fish in clean covered containers or packaging, on the bottom shelf of the fridge so they can’t drip onto other foods,
for a fridge to keep food safe it needs to be kept at a temperature between 0-5°C,
try not to overfill your fridge to avoid the temperature rising – planning meals can help with this, and
save space by avoiding chilling food which can be safely stored at room temperature, such as a jar of peanut butter or soft drinks.

Cooking food

If you're not used to cooking for yourself, or are cooking more often than you're used to, there's a few things you need to remember:

always check your food is steaming hot in the middle,
always follow all cooking instructions on the packaging, particularly for different cooking methods,
some meats have to be cooked properly and should not be eaten rare, such as burgers, sausages, pork, turkey and chicken,
some cuts such as beef or lamb can be eaten rare in the middle, but the general rule is food should be steaming hot, with no pink meat with the juices running clear (if you are cooking meat),
the best way to tell if food is cooked thoroughly is to use a food thermometer - cooked meat, such as chicken or burgers, should reach 75°C in the thickest part, and
a food thermometer would be a good first purchase after leaving home, or it’s worth putting one on your Christmas list!
for tips on how to cook healthier and cheaper meals, check out our Eat Well, Your Way resource. We also have pages on kitchen equipment and setting up a food cupboard which are great for first time students.

Stay hydrated!

To stay hydrated, try to drink at least 6-8 glasses of fluid every day. It helps you to concentrate and is essential to keep your body functioning normally;

water is the best choice, but tea and coffee also count,
when you’re out and about, take a refillable water bottle to class to drink from,
in Scotland, tap water is safe, free and better for the environment than plastic bottles and cans of soft drinks.