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July 8, 2006 Here is a way to judge if you are going to eat in a restaurant. Go to the bathroom first. Look for these factors before going to the counter or your table to order: Is the toilet flushed? Is there toilet paper? Is there toilet paper on the floor? Are the hand soap dispensers filled? Are there towels or a hand dryer available? I had to drive across country just last weekend. I am currently a breast feeding mother and I have to either breast feed my daughter under a blanket (so my breast is not exposed to prudes), or seek privacy in a public bathroom. I like to feed my child in a handicapped bathroom because I can get as far away from the toilet as possible. I would breast feed in public but my daughter prefers to eat uncovered. I had to work hard to find clean bathrooms because I wanted to protect my daughter. I looked at several normal fast food restaurants for a decent place to feed my child in and the cleanliness of the bathrooms were appalling. Then I started thinking: If these bathrooms are not clean enough for me to sit on the floor to breast feed my child in private, then how clean are the employees hands that are preparing food for millions of people. That thought made me feel like vomiting. One of the most basic regulations for restaurants to keep their restaurant license is that employees must clean their hands. This originated partially with Typhoid Mary, who spread the deadly disease to thirty three people (killing 3) before it was discovered that she was working as a cook in 1907. It is well known that many deadly or serious diseases are spread by not keeping hands sanitary. Employees must wash their hands between touching uncooked meats and other foods, after using the bathroom, and after smoking. This prevents Salmonella, E. Coli, and even the common cold (70% of flu and other colds would be prevented by people washing their hands after using the restroom). Why mention this in relation to bathroom cleanliness? Two reasons: One, if employees are constantly going into the bathroom to wash, they should see the condition of the bathroom, and clean it. A dirty bathroom suggests that employees are not washing their hands with the frequency required by law. Two, if employees are entering the bathroom and not cleaning, this suggests a disregard for sanitation which does not give me much confidence in the cleanliness of the kitchen or their precautions in food handling. So the fastest way to tell if a restaurant is a healthy place to eat is to look in the bathroom. Since you want to know if a restaurant is healthy before you order, go to the bathroom first.
By the way, when I was looking at bathrooms,
McDonald's had the dirtiest bathrooms, Hardee's had
the cleanest.
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