Food safety guide · Street food · Food safety
Street-food hygiene: what you can check before ordering
Visible handling checks and questions for an Indian street-food stop, with clear limits on what you can know.
You cannot see every food safety risk from the front of a stall. You can still pay attention to how the food is handled.
Watch the preparation, not the crowd
A busy counter or a famous name does not tell you whether the water is safe or the ingredients were stored correctly. Watch whether ready-to-eat food is protected and whether utensils used for raw food touch cooked food.
WHO’s safer-food guidance centres on clean handling, keeping raw and cooked foods apart, thorough cooking, suitable temperatures and safe water. These are more useful questions than how attractive the stall looks.
Sources: WHO: Five keys to safer food (PDF)
Questions worth asking
Ask about the water used in drinks and ice. Ask when the dish was prepared and how it is held before serving. If you have an allergy, ask about the ingredients and shared equipment before ordering.
A vendor may not be able to answer every question. If you cannot establish something important for your needs, choose an option with clearer information.
- Is the cooked food protected from raw ingredients?
- Are hands and serving utensils handled cleanly?
- How are water, ice and prepared food stored?
- Can the vendor explain the ingredients?
Training and observation have limits
The September Mumbai training session covered these kinds of hygiene practices. Participation in a programme does not establish that every serving is safe.
Treat what you observe as limited information. Do not use a social-media clip or a home test to accuse a stall of adulteration without sound evidence.
Sources and further reading
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