Hockey in Raleigh is back. After a somewhat surprising playoff run in the spring, the Carolina Hurricanes took the ice last night at the RBC Center to open the 2009-10 season vs. the top-ranked Philadelphia Flyers.

The ‘Canes lost 2-0, in part because of a futile powerplay (0-for-8).

I took my dad to the game (right, self-pic, exactly as shown) and we debated getting a bbq sandwich after the first period but the price tag was a bit steep ($7).

My dad asked me "So, how do you think they are doing, food safety-wise".

I told him that it’s tough to say, anytime you eat you put trust in a food handler somewhere and hopefully they know somthing about risks and risk reduction. I watched for a couple of minutes and snapped the below pic of the bbq (below left, food porn shot, exactly as shown).

While sitting around today and watching some college football I started to think a bit more about my dad’s question and dug up some inspection reports. I couldn’t find the Carolina BBQ stand in question but was able to browse through 20 or so other RBC Center sites from the past couple of years. Temperature abuse, especially hot-holding seemed to be a common violation.

The bbq looked and smelled good, and judging by the lineups, was moved out of the pans to patrons’ sandwiches pretty fast. But who knows at what temperature, and how long it was held before we came by. I hope that someone did.