If you read back through this discussion and the other big thread on RLWD which preceded then you'll pick up a bunch of info related to this question.
In a nutshell (and not to be difficult, but honest) it largely depends on what you mean by "best." How much risk is acceptable versus the change in lifestyle, time, and material expense involved in reducing risk? This will vary from person to person.
The only way to be 100% safe, 100% of the time, at this juncture is to only eat cooked food and drink boiled or otherwise micron-filtered/UV sterilized catchment water. This includes items such as restaurant salads (slugs have been found in local restaurant salads).
That said, there are all sorts of ways to reduce overall risk through:
-being careful about where and what you choose to eat (we tell all our visitors that veggie smoothies are off the menu unless we or someone we trust preps them),
-reducing the number of rats around the garden,
-using slug control measures,
-carefully cleaning produce (more on this below),
-being careful with fruits whether from the tree or windfalls,
-keep food covered at picnics and anywhere slugs can crawl in (semi-slugs are FAST and climb tall vertical walls)
-keeping a sharp eye on toddlers and infants in areas they might encounter (and eat) slugs.
My advice (and that is all it is, just my advice) with regard to cleaning produce is to prep a couple 5 gallon buckets, one with salt brine solution and one with fresh rinse water. Soaking and agitating produce in the salt solution shocks slugs hiding in crevices and almost always causes them to immediately drop off the leaf surface. Brine kills the larvae liberated as the slugs dissolve. Rinsing with clean fresh water removes most of the traces of brine and whatever goop may be adhering. What it does not do is dissolve slime trails and kill any larvae glued beneath the dried slime, between the slime and the leaf surface, so if there are signs of slug damage and feces (slug and snail feces tend to be coiled, versus pelletized insect droppings) then cooking or discarding would be prudent. Pulling bunched veggies apart and brushing each leaf under running water is a good idea, while watching for slugs. There is an effective veggie sanitizer dip which can be used as well, brand name Epiclean. Weak bleach solution can also be used (rinse it off, afterward) but will tend to leave a bleach smell behind almost no matter how well rinsed.
It is worth being aware not all slugs are equal when it comes to being RLW disease vectors. One semi-slug can harbor many thousands of larvae (upwards of 7,000). A Cuban slug can also harbor hundreds of larvae, perhaps even a couple thousand in a heavily infected Cuban slug. Other species of slugs, not so much. Giant African snails can harbor bunches, but those are almost impossible to accidentally eat (they tend to be huge). So, if your garden &/or fruit patch is infested with semi-slugs or even Cuban slugs, then this is a different degree of risk than if other species are present.
Catchment water appears to be OK as long as it runs through micropore filter(s) of the appropriate size(s) and is UV treated, otherwise boiling would be advisable.
I hope this helps answer your question.
Actually, I'd add one more point for everyone: please make sure your elected officials hear from you, loud and clear, saying it is unacceptable for this issue to not receive attention and funding. This is not going away, folks, and as the ideal intermediate host (the invasive semi-slug) expands its range there will be more frequent and more severe problems unless the issue is addressed forthrightly and effectively through research (such as developing a quick and inexpensive blood marker test for ID of RLWD in those infected) and prevention education. We cannot hear semi-slugs as we can coqui frogs, but the semi-slugs and coqui frogs both arrived in Hawai'i at about the same time and their ranges and populations are expanding in similar manner.
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Nina Paley's music video "All Creative Work Is Derivative"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcvd5JZkUXY&list=FLP7Vhr8C1-hS6BNSE3s6sMw&index=57&feature=plpp_video
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