Money Saving Canadian Mom: Maple Leaf Food Safety Roundtable Event

As you know, I was invited to the Maple Leaf Roundtable discussion. It was at the new Thinkfood center in Mississauga. Leading the discussion were CEO Michael Mcain and Senior Vice President, Food Safety and Quality Assurance Sharon Beals.

The discussion was frank, honest and very informative. Yes, 22 people died from eating our products, this is how it happened and these are the 20 million dollar changes we have instilled to prevent it from happening again.

Some new measure in place are:

*Taking apart and cleaning all machines that they are able to.

* If they can't physically do this then the machines are wheeled into a room and basically baked. (listeria is killed by heat)

*If the machine can't be moved then a hot steam unit is placed under the machine and it is wrapped up to simulate a hot sauna

*A meeting takes place every morning at 8:30am to discuss the test results from all 26 ready to eat facilities

Did you know that in 2009 Maple Leaf did 125,000 tests in their plant? That averages out to 342 tests per day! With new testing technology in place Maple Leaf gets it's tests results back in 36-48hrs. Government standards are to get the test results back in 1 week.

What about the people who make my food? Maple Leaf is providing constant education. This includes impromptu line meetings between supervisors and employees and interactive training programs.

After our discussion we were served a lovely meal by Chef John Placko and his culinary team. It consisted of the Maple Leaf Prime chicken(dijon and herb) and the Maple Leaf Flattened chicken (wild garlic and herb) and Dempster's Oven Fresh Baguette

We also got to bring home a new Maple Leaf product, Natural Selections Deli meat. I had it yesterday for lunch and it was very good. The thing I like about this product is I know what all the ingredients are. I usually don't purchase deli meat because of all the ingredients I can't pronounce! I will definitely be purchasing some of this for our lunches. It was great on the Dempster's baguette with swiss, dijon and tomatoes.