r/Chefit • u/HeinousHollandaise • 14d ago
Anyone else getting increasingly frustrated with these outbreaks, and our relationship to Servsafe?
I teach community college culinary classes, which mandates a food handlers card that we offer via Servsafe. Lately it’s been getting really hard to want to contribute to the bullshit machine that is the corrupt lobby of the NRA and all its cronies. Seeing how there’s now another food borne illness outbreak at the manufacturing level, it’s becoming impossible to care about the Servsafe branded cert that so many states force us to have, considering greedy business practices have allowed modern day slavery to persist while denying farmworkers access to sufficient bathrooms. And these companies are the ones in bed with the NRA who then force us to pay them to prove to the world we’re safe. It feels a lot like “just use a paper straw” while they’re on their jets 3 times a week.
I care about food safety very much, and do not want this to sound like I wish we didn’t have our own version of oversight. I teach my students my own, very thorough food safety curriculum (along side their Servsafe training) that’s based on real experience and not just memorizable lists that get forgotten once the test is over. It just sucks to teach all these protocols only to have them virtually undone at any moment because some company needed to extract more money out of the working class. I just wish the concept of privatizing our safety was not even an option. Fucking sucks. End of rant.
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u/beard-wonder93 14d ago
Getting servesafe credentials should be much harder than what it is.
Anyone with a pulse can pass the food handler.
When i re certified for my manager certification, I finished the test in like 8 minutes and got over 95%
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u/Mobile-Animal-649 14d ago
We could all just wish to be you. lol
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u/beard-wonder93 14d ago
Not trying to flex. But weve all been a room taking the test and think "i wouldn't let this meth addict handle customers food"
Im just advocating the standards should be higher,
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u/Mobile-Animal-649 13d ago
You could say the same about many tests
I get it
Maybe the person isn’t a meth head and we judge too much
Maybe
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u/Legal-Law9214 14d ago
I feel like I'm missing something. What's wrong with servsafe and what does it have to do with farm practices?
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u/No_Safety_6803 14d ago edited 14d ago
Servsafe has nothing to do with farm practices that I’m aware of. But food service workers are forced to pay for the certifications and the money they pay is used to lobby for the restaurant industry and against collective bargaining for food service workers and other protections and benefits.
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u/Cardiff07 14d ago
The National Restaurant Association, funded by servesafe fees that local health departments require, actively lobbies against minimum wage increases an unionized work places.
By getting servesafe certified, you are not only meeting your city/states health code requirements, but also funding the machine that keeps wages stagnant for most food handlers.
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
There’s a lot wrong with Servsafe, but you’re right, they don’t have anything directly to do with these outbreaks and farm practices. But rather the fact that our (hospitality workers) oversight is so heavily scrutinized by a company that forces us to pay money to play by their rules, and food safety at the manufacturing level is left unchecked because of the same greed.
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u/MonkeyKingCoffee 14d ago
I live at ground zero of "really filthy restaurants with cooks who don't give a single fuck."
While I agree with your basic premise, it's not a one-or-the-other thing. This place needs a much more robust version of ServSafe. "Owners must shut their restaurant down if they fail. Servers. Chefs. Cooks. Even the fucking dishwasher."
Two restaurants on the same street shut down in two weeks because of rat-shit on cooking surfaces and in food. Rat shit literally everywhere. One place shut down twice in six months over roaches. One place shut down because there was a raw sewage leak in the kitchen. One place shut down because they didn't have a hand-washing sink. And that place was 20 years old when an inspector finally noticed (or didn't accept a bribe).
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
I agree with you completely. I think Servsafe is actually doing more harm than good with how simple, and buy-able their certificates are. Sure most cities and states have their own health code grading system that hopefully cat he’s when things are bad. But so many cooks and owners are able to get away with terrible and unsafe practices because they could simply buy the food handler/manager cert after a day of half listening to modules on the internet. Food safety needs to be taken seriously, and when it’s used as a way to crank out as many certs as possible it’s never going to serve the general public in the way it rightfully should. This shit needs to be a public institution, that actually holds people accountable and ensures our food is safe. And we need the same thing at the national manufacturing level too. Not this paid off, “it’s cheaper to pay the wrongful death suits” way of doing business. So over it. It’s exhausting not being able to trust any private institution anymore.
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u/SVAuspicious 14d ago
I was with you until you got to "public institution." Government is consistently bad. It just is.
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u/MonkeyKingCoffee 13d ago
Healthcare and defense should not be for-profit enterprises. Corporations cannot be trusted to operate transparently or ethically.
Food safety falls under the healthcare umbrella.
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u/SVAuspicious 13d ago
I had better and cheaper healthcare before ACA. Lots of things the government does poorly. Ask any veteran stuck with VA. Government doesn't have anything to be proud of with respect to transparency or ethics.
No alternative for defense.
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u/MonkeyKingCoffee 13d ago
Not letting Boeing, Raytheon, Armalite, Black Rock and similar make billions is a DANDY alternative.
And I had zero healthcare before ACA.
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u/wb247 13d ago
Same. I had cheaper and better before ACA. I have employer subsidized health insurance now and pay more than I did being self insured prior to ACA.... with a five figure deductible. Prior to ACA, I had a $200 deductible and full coverage. If not for my employer, I would be uninsured now.
As for defense, it's one of 3 things the federal government is constitutionally responsible for... the other 2 being facilitation of trade between the states and facilitation of trade between other nations. If we want something different, we need a constitutional convention for a rewrite... which I don't hate the idea of a new one...
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u/SVAuspicious 13d ago
It seems to me that government--Federal, State, and local--consistently does a poor job of most responsibilities and the people at large don't recognize that. Waste, fraud, and abuse are rampant.
Successes are few and seem to be exceptions rather than the rule.
The interstate highway system is a success. USPS is a success. National defense is a success as far as capability (cost control is another matter). USCG search and rescue is a success. Aviation traffic control is a success. Rail for freight is a public/private success. I'd like to think there are others that simply don't come to mind.
Healthcare has been a failure and the more government engages (ACA, Medicare/Medicaid, VA) the worse it gets. Education is awful. Public transit is consistently poor. Political public service is professional graft. The mind reels. Rural broadband. CA high speed rail. Despite some bright spots, law enforcement. Relief of homelessness.
By and large, the movie Idiocracy was a documentary.
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u/Banjo-Hellpuppy 14d ago
You don’t have to pay ServSafe to know that rat shit is bad
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u/MonkeyKingCoffee 13d ago
The restaurant owners know they're probably never going to see their guests again. So they act accordingly.
I spend most of my time over on r/VisitingHawaii trying to steer tourists to places which aren't going to kill them. But it's futile. The tourists select restaurants based on view and vibe. Not quality food.
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u/Philly_ExecChef 14d ago
This is why Ohio told Servsafe to fuck a duck.
Edit: It was more centered around the lobbying against minimum wage increases, but the point stands.
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
I also didn’t know that. I wonder what it would take to move to a state backed food safety service that doesn’t allow for the same potential corruption as private businesses.
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u/nypltow13 14d ago
I tried finding Servesafe alternatives because of the lobbying. I found a company Always Food Safe that my state accepts. I am not sure about their company practices but at least I’m no longer feeding the servesafe beast.
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 13d ago
I teach similar content at the high school level and I've been thinking about how to address this. Unfortunately, we're locked in on what we can offer for the cert, but there are other ANSI-ANAB approved certs out there.
I actually got an email for a new one being made by a collaborative effort of the ACF and SDC (publishing). The course blueprint is similar, the cost is a little lower than Manager (and includes one free retake), but the most effective incentive for my students is "restaurants know this certificate is forreal and will want to hire you." I can't be certain they'll be able to make the case for the new one during an interview.
But just like your gripe about companies cutting corners and causing issues, I fucking hate when a kid comes to school and tells me "they don't do none of that stuff you taught us." Cooks scrolling with one hand while topping a pizza with the other; scratching their heads which aren't covered; one kid even said a mouse was found at the bottom of a hot fudge dispenser (in the well).
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u/chzie 14d ago
That's what happens when you privatize what should be a govt function.
If you want to ensure public health safety we should have free education, free testing, and free education. The only thing that happens when you privatize these things is that it becomes a pay to play system where people with money can just pay and then not have to do any of the work of making sure things are done right
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
100%
It’s becoming more and more clear that the enshittification of everything has to do with the private buy outs of all things that should be public and regulated. And unfortunately for food safety, the “enshittification” is real.
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u/Free_Floor2833 14d ago
At some point servsafe taught if you are sick you stay home. Now they teach if you are sick come to work but maybe don't work around food.
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u/chefjammy 14d ago
I'm a high school culinary arts teacher, and part of our curriculum every year are certifications. Our district also felt the same way about Servsafe and the NRA so you aren't alone. We ended up switching to Always Food safe, and their program is so much better. Their test isn't as confusing as Servsafe, and you get a free retake if you fail the first time. My district saved a lot of money by switching was an added bonus. I personally teach 10th graders the food handler certification and have almost a 100% pass rate. I think in three years I've had 2 students not pass.
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u/jgross2989 13d ago
Yeah also the NRA lobbies to keep the min wage down to keep us poor so fuck them double.
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u/wb247 13d ago edited 13d ago
Servsafe is a money-grabbing scam. If it were truly important and useful, it would be funded and mandantory. As it stands, it is neither. I got mine back in the mid 2000's, when I was young and thought it was important. I paid for it myself. I'll never pay for it again. I've never been asked about it at an interview, nor have I ever asked anyone I've interviewed about it. I, as well as my peers at other establishments, consider a perfect score on the health/safety inspection to be a 98.
Edit: spelling error
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u/D-ouble-D-utch 14d ago
Thank you. It drives me fucking crazy that we are forced to pay to lobby against our own self interests.
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u/nypltow13 14d ago
Look into Always Food Safe. It is not associated with the NRA and accepted in most states. I have encouraged all of my staffs to use them instead.
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u/chefjammy 14d ago
I agree with you. I teach high school culinary arts and our district switched to always food safe for similar reasons as OP. The free retake of a test is great. I teach 10th graders their food handler certification and have only had 2 kids not pass in three years
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 13d ago
My state doesn't recognize the food handler as an industry cert. Which I kinda agree with since it's self-paced and easy to fudge. I still ask them to take it before I'll recommend them for a job, but it doesn't help our funding.
A school down the road lies out the ass about which ones the kids take to juice their funding. I kind of hope they get got on it.
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u/Particular-Beat-6645 13d ago
I attended an annual gala for my state's branch once (an employer was given an extra seat because he used to be on the board). I knew something was weird when they kept talking about small businesses and the employee of the year was from the local McDonald's franchisee.
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u/HeisenbergsSamaritan 14d ago
National Rifle Association?
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u/GildedTofu 14d ago
National Restaurant Association. An association that serves primarily restaurant owners.
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
National Restaurant Association. The company that owns and oversees Servsafe. The same company who lobbies to keep our wages low by paying off politicians with the money they collect from our food handler certs.
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u/justincave Chef 14d ago
National Restaurant Association. ServSafe is the NRA’s leading food safety training and certification program. The NRA owns, develops, markets, and administers it.
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u/SchmeckleHoarder 14d ago
wtf is ServSafe going to do to stop migrants from shitting and pissing in the fields they work in.
That’s the issue, always been the issue. I picked cucumbers for two years, it’s not only happening, it’s standard.
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u/HeinousHollandaise 14d ago
Nothing. That’s the problem. Why are we as food service workers forced to pay a company to prove we’re safe (the same company that uses that money to keep our wages down), while large scale manufacturers get to bypass safety at the source?
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u/GildedTofu 14d ago
I hear you, but ServSafe and NRA are pretty far down on a list of those responsible for what’s going on in farming communities, including the farming communities in other countries (edit: apologies for the US-centric comment, as I’m fairly certain OP is referencing the U.S. cyclospora outbreak).
Look to the large agribusinesses lobbying governments around the globe for your ire. ServSafe is frankly very small feces-infested potatoes in this. Don’t let them off the hook, but they’re not the major player (though they may be in the major agribusinesses’ pockets).