COLLEGE STATION — While many restaurants tout menu items for locavores, employees of those eateries also now have an important local offering — food safety testing.
A widely used food safety exam ServSafe, now is available through a partnership with the Texas Restaurant Association and the Texas AgriLife Extension Service. That means workers may find a testing location in their county or one nearby, according to Rebecca Dittmar, AgriLife Extension program specialist for food protection management.
While the restaurant association conducts the testing in many urban settings, AgriLife Extension and its core of family and consumer science agents serve all 254 Texas counties, Dittmar explained.
Partnering with AgriLife Extension expands the training network that already exists throughout the state, she said.
“Because our AgriLife Extension agents regularly provide adult education, they are able to do food safety training for people prior to taking the exam. This helps people pass and be better prepared to handle food safely in a restaurant,” Dittmar added.
“Food Safety: It’s Our Business,” the book used in the training, can be ordered in English (SP-61) and Spanish (SP-61S) online from the AgriLife Extension bookstore at https://agrilifebookstore.org.
The training covers core principles about keeping food safe, such as handling, preparing, serving, cleaning and sanitizing, Dittmar added.
People interested in taking the exam locally can check the Texas Restaurant Association’s site, http://www.restaurantville.com/, to find participating AgriLife Extension county offices. The association now lists 46 such locations.
“Individuals who have taken the ServSafe food manager safety course and need to have an exam proctored can call the nearest extension office to find out when tests are being offered,” according to the association’s website.
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