Microbiological quality of Chinese style fried rice available in hotels, restaurants and take away outlets in the Colombo city

Sri Lanka is a well-known tourist destination, and as a result, ensuring food safety has become increasingly important for public health. Chinese-style fried rice is particularly popular among consumers, especially within the low-income category. Therefore, this descriptive cross-sectional study aimed to assess the food hygiene quality of Chinese-style fried rice sold in hotels, restaurants, and takeaway outlets in Colombo city. To conduct the study, we used systematic random sampling and cluster sampling techniques to select 25 food establishments within the Colombo city limits that prepared and sold Chinese-style fried rice. We collected 200 samples of fried rice, which comprised 35% vegetable, 29% chicken, 18% seafood, 9% egg, 5% beef, and 3.5% mixed varieties. We performed Aerobic Plate Counts following the US FDA Manual of Food Quality Control (1992) guidelines. Additionally, we detected and enumerated coliforms, fecal coliforms, and E. coli using the SLS516: part3:1982 standard. Our findings revealed that 39.5% of the samples had Aerobic Plate Counts greater than 10 ⁵ cfu/g. Alarmingly, 24.5% of the total fried rice samples tested contained ≥ 1,100 coliforms/g, while 16% contained ≥ 1,100 fecal coliforms/g. Furthermore, E. coli was detected in 39% of the tested fried rice samples, with the highest contamination levels found in egg, vegetable, and mixed varieties. To enhance the microbial quality of ready-to-eat foods sold in Colombo's food establishments, we strongly recommend the involvement of Public Health Inspectors (PHIs) focused on food safety.