Ordering food can make us moms anxious in view of this pandemic. And sometimes, no matter how health officials and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tell us that there are no conclusive studies yet about food causing COVID-19 transmission, we would rather stay on the safe side.
But there are times when your family may need to order food delivery. Whether it is because of choice or necessity, there are ways to lower your risk and anxiety levels.
Safe food ordering
Sharing with you some things that we do during the few times we decided to order food delivery:
1. Order only from restaurants that you trust. Whether it is a well known restaurant chain or a local resto that you love, ask yourself if you think that the management of that restaurant follow strict health protocols before and during this pandemic.
2. Choose contactless delivery when possible. If it is not possible, you can leave instructions to the delivery courier to just leave the package outside your door, and collect the money you left out there.
3. Immediately transfer the food to home containers. Discard the food packaging right away, avoid touching anything especially your face, and wash your hands with soap and water for 20 seconds.
4. Reheat the food. Soup-based and saucy food and noodle and pasta dishes can be reheated on stove top for at least 3 to 5 minutes. You can also use a microwave for this for 1 to 2 minutes. Steamed food can be re-steamed for about three to five minutes or reheated in the microwave with a small bowl of water for 1 to 2 minutes.
For chicken, pizza, barbecue or food items that would get dried up when heated in the microwave, the oven is the best answer. Heat at 350F for at least 3 to 5 minutes. Toaster ovens will work too!
Safe eating during the COVID-19 Pandemic
I have not yet mustered the courage to order food that cannot be heated at home like cakes, donuts, beverages etc so I dont have any tips for those. But those mentioned above are what I do in the three times we have tried food delivery since the lockdowns. We have ditched our microwave long before the pandemic and so I just reheat the food in a pan or in our oven. I think just like our grocery disinfection routine, this practice will be part of our household’s new normal. Now if only I could make crunchilicious Korean fried chicken then this post would not have been published (In the photo I used in this post, I placed the different variants of korean fried chicken in foil, and then in a baking dish so that i could reheat them altogether at once without the sauce of each variant touching the other chicken wings)
Happy eating and stay safe and healthy mommies!
For more pandemic homemaking tips, hope you can check out our whole Facebook Album on this, visit our website happypinaymommy.com, browse our Pinterest pandemic parenting board, or follow us on Instagram.