Friday 2 March 2012

News Brief: Breakfast stores are dirty, unhealthy and not nutritious


Hygiene and nutrition experts sent to survey fast-food breakfast stores in the Taipei area found shocking circumstances, the Common Health Magazine (康健雜誌) reports in the cover story of its March edition (full Chinese-language article here). 

Claiming that 80 percent of the population buys breakfast from these “lane mouth” breakfast stores (巷口早餐店) [NOMM: In Taipei perhaps, but for Taiwan as a whole this figure seems very high], CH magazine checked up on the nation’s five biggest chain franchises: 

Mei&Mei (瑞麟美而美), My Warm Day (麥味登), Good Morning Beautiful and Breakfast (早安美芝城), Glin MeRMe (巨林美而美), and Hongya Hamburger 弘爺漢堡). 

It assessed them for environmental hygiene (環境衛生), food safety (食品安全), and nutritional balance (營養均衡). 

On the first count: they found 0 percent of staff washing their hands between touching money and touching food; on the second: products in two-thirds of stores showed high levels of germs; and on the third: the food was too oily, too few vegetables were available, and the drinks were too sweet.

My Warm Day did the best [NOMM: perhaps “least awfully” is more accurate].

CHM’s found the nine main shortcomings to be:

1. Staff not washing or disinfecting hands after handling money and touching food. (100%)
2. Staff not washing or disinfecting hands after touching fridges then touching toast or hamburger buns.100%
3. Food handlers not wearing mouth masks or hats. (87%)
4. Serious accumulations of dirt and/or dust on ceilings, walls and/or pipes. (67%)
5. Contact with foodstuffs after using cleaning cloths. (60%)
6. Staff wearing rings, bracelets and/or other jewelry. (47%)
7. Trash not cleared from table surfaces and floors. (47%)
8. Sauce bottles not capped. (47%)
9. Mixing of raw and cooked foods, increasing the risk of cross contamination. (40%)

Translation © Jiyue Publications 2012

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