Keeping your kitchen clean is the best way to avoid getting sick, and most of what you can do revolves around washing.

• Wash your hands for at least 20 seconds before handling any food
• Wash your utensils, cutting boards, and countertops with hot, soapy water after preparing raw meat, poultry, seafood, or eggs
• Wash your hands for another 20 seconds after touching raw meat, poultry, seafood, or eggs

An exception to the washing rule is that you should not wash raw chicken or turkey.

This may seem counterintuitive, but here’s why:

• Raw poultry and its juices can carry harmful bacteria like Campylobacter or Salmonella
• When you rinse your poultry under running water, those bacteria can splash around your sink, cutlery, or anything nearby, thus increasing your risk of contracting foodborne illnesses

If you want to clean up the juices and goo on your raw poultry, give ’em a pat-down with paper towels. Make sure to properly dispose of those paper towels and wash your hands immediately afterward.

Now may be the time to shop around for an additional cutting board; to avoid getting sick, you’re going to want to avoid reusing the same one for different kinds of foods.

Some other tips to keep ’em separated:

• When grocery shopping, keep raw meat, poultry, seafood, and their juices away from other foods.
• Keep raw or marinating meat, poultry, seafood, and eggs separate from all other foods in the refrigerator. Store raw meat, poultry, and seafood in sealed containers or packages so the juices don’t leak onto other foods.
• Use one cutting board or plate for raw meat, poultry, and seafood and a separate cutting board or plate for produce, bread, and other foods that won’t be cooked.

Ensure you’re cooking food to the correct internal temperature. Get a meat thermometer—they’re inexpensive and the best way to avoid chomping down undercooked meat.

Here are the minimum internal temperatures your foods should be before consuming.

There’s a “Danger Zone” for foods: it exists between 40°F and 140°F. This range is essentially “room temperature,” and its when bacteria has a field day and multiplies rapidly.

• Keep your refrigerator at 40°F or below and your freezer at 0°F or below
• If your refrigerator doesn’t have a built-in thermometer, keep an appliance thermometer inside
• Package warm or hot food into several clean, shallow containers and then refrigerate.
• Put small portions of hot food in the refrigerator since they will chill faster.
• Refrigerate perishable food (meat, seafood, dairy, cut fruit, some vegetables, and cooked leftovers) within 2 hours
• If food is exposed to temperatures above 90°F—such as sitting in a hot car or displayed on a picnic platter—refrigerate it within 1 hour.
• Thaw frozen food safely in the refrigerator, in cold water, or in the microwave
• Never thaw food on the counter—bacteria multiplies quickly in the parts of the food that reach room temperature