TAMPA, FL -- For customers at one Tampa italian restaurant, it's all about the pasta.
But for owner Sonia Barcena it's all about her customers.
"I think we've catered to you guys before?" Barcena asks her customers at a table.
Barcena owns Rigatoni Tuscan Oven in Tampa and is now more focused on sanitary practices because of H1N1.
It's all spelled out in a memo posted for her employees.
"More frequent hand washing, cleaning things even more frequently than we do from door handles to salt and pepper shakers to the table tops. Little safety precautions that we feel would help keep our clients safe," Barcena said.
"If you're not feeling well don't come into work. Call your manager. He or she will let you off for the day," said Christina Johnson of the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association.
Johnson says they've been talking about the swine flu before most had even heard of it.
"It's safety for our employees, our consumers and our customers," Johnson said.
The association says the state's certification for restaurant employees prepares them on how to prevent the spread.
"I'm kind of a Germaphobe when it comes to things just knowing what I know," admitted Richard Ferolito, a retired Rhode Island health inspector.
Ferolito says he's worried about the swine flu spreading because of food safety practices he's witnessed.
"Barehand contact on ready to eat foods, it's a big problem. People should be wearing gloves and changing their gloves often and then washing their hands more," Ferolito said.
And that's what Sweet Tomatoes Restaurants says is happening in their kitchens along with hand sanitizer for customers at the door.
The newest policy?
Replacing serving utensils all day long so germs are not transferred from one customer to another.
"We're doing it on an hourly basis as a rule and making sure we put out new utensils each time," said Sweet Tomatoes Corporate Executive Director of Food Safety Carl Klein.
Klein says the chain just recently created an H1N1 plan and convincing ill employees it's ok to call out sick is a crucial part of it.
"Normally in the restaurant business, you just tough it out and work and we're really trying to change that mindset, making sure that even managers aren't allowed to work," Klein added.
As for Barcena, she hopes not to miss a day of work, after getting the swine flu shot the same day her daughter got vaccinated.
"I'm asking her to get the shot, I might as well protect our family and people around me as well," Barcena said.
