Safety first

There has never been as much awareness of food-safety issues among caterers as there is now. Fridges are everywhere, and a lot of food is bought in ready-cooked and frozen from factories with extremely high food-safety standards, yet the incidence of food poisoning from eating out remains stubbornly high.

Figures from the Health Protection Agency for all cases of food poisoning in England and Wales for 2002, the last year for which data is available, are 72,000. That is a slight fall from the previous three years, when the figures were about 85,000, but it is still alarmingly high.

Steve Benson, sales director at refrigeration supplier Coggins Welch, thinks he knows one of the contributing causes of out-of-home food poisoning. "More emphasis needs to be placed on food safety rather than profit," he says. "Food products only have a certain shelf life, and although storing food in fridges at the correct temperature will ensure longer life, it will only slow down bacteria growth, not stop it."

Even worse, adds Benson, is mixing something old out of the fridge with something that is fresh. "That just infects the fresh food and does nothing to stop the bugs in the old food from continuing to multiply. Managing food waste is an important cost-control skill for a chef, but it should not be at the expense of food safety."

Benson has further advice on food-safety good practice with fridges: while there is no legal obligation to keep separate fridges for cooked food and raw food, he says it should be the rule for any professional kitchen, adding that some environmental health officers might refuse to approve a restaurant kitchen that keeps raw and frozen food in the same fridge.

Manufacturers designing servery counters place great importance on the food-safety element, particularly with chilled foods, as they often stay on display for longer periods than hot food and might include high-risk foods such as dairy, chilled meat and cold fish. Yet the conflict between keeping the food safe and presenting it in an attractive way, well-lit and within reach of the customer is always a dilemma for caterers.

The bright lights which illuminate the food and make it look tempting on a servery counter can be a source of heat, and heat not only makes a higher energy demand on the refrigeration unit, it also can raise the temperature of the chilled food on display, which is a food-safety issue that caterers should be aware of, according to Gary Allen, sales director for servery manufacturer E&R Moffat.

An easy way to increase food safety is to prevent cross-contamination of fresh and cooked foods at the point of preparation by using different-coloured high-density plastic chopping boards for the six recognised categories of food. It is not set down in law, but good food-safety practice says these are the colours of boards and the foods that should be cut on them: red for raw meat, blue for raw fish, yellow for cooked meats, green for salad and fruit products, brown for vegetables, and white for bakery and dairy produce. Having the same colour coding on the handles of knives further adds to good food-safety practice.

Signage, too, plays an important role in food safety in the kitchen, even something as simple as identifying which wash basins are for handwashing and which are for food. Put signs above washbasins and sinks in food areas to indicate what they should be used for, and make sure that staff use basins and sinks only for their intended purpose. Although basic training teaches the colour-coding system for chopping boards, a wipe-down laminated sign on the wall is a useful reminder for kitchen staff.

Food temperature probes are a relatively new development in food safety. Their most obvious functions are to check that chilled and frozen goods-in are at the correct temperature for storage and to probe chilled food in fridges and serveries to check that the temperature remains at a safe level. A bonus of food probes is that they can also be used to give accurate control over meat being cooked in an oven. Before and after using a probe the sensor arm must be thoroughly sanitised. Best practice is to have a sensor for cold checking and another for hot checking.

Pre-bagging of portioned and pre-prepared food items, either in plastic pouches, vacuum-packs or reusable plastic boxes, is growing in popularity. This allows for preparation at quiet times and stricter portion control. Everything packaged in this way needs to be labelled with both its content and, more importantly, the packaging date to ensure food is not held for too long before cooking. Dissolving labels are now available to eliminate the problem of old sticky labels building up on lids.

At the heart of any food-safety management system is HACCP, the acronym for hazard analysis, critical control points, a regimented food-safety method of working in the kitchen. All professional kitchens should have HACCP as a kitchen discipline, but it needs to be documented. Paper documentation is the way for many kitchens, but there is a growing trend towards electronic capturing of HACCP. n

Safety rules for food held on display - Hot food must be kept above 63¡C (145¡F). When serving or displaying hot food, it may be kept below 63¡C for a maximum of two hours. This can be done only once; then it must be thrown away or cooled as quickly as possible and kept chilled until used.

• Chilled food intended for reuse in another service period must be kept below 8¡C.
• Food may be held above 8¡C for serving or displaying, but only for a maximum of four hours. This can be done only once; then the food should be thrown away.
• Use a probe thermometer occasionally to check whether food being kept hot or cold before serving is at a safe temperature - but make sure the thermometer is thoroughly clean before and after putting it in the food.

FSA hygiene survey The Food Standards Agency interviewed more than 1,000 staff and managers in small independent catering businesses for a food-safety and hygiene survey. These are the highlights:

• More than one-third of staff (39%) are neglecting to wash their hands after visits to the lavatory while at work.
• Half of all those interviewed (53%) did not wash their hands before preparing food.
• Fewer than two-thirds (59%) of the catering staff questioned had a certificate in basic food hygiene.
• Only 32% believed good food-hygiene practices were important to their business, compared with 64% who saw good food as the key to keeping their customers.

Contacts
Coggins Welch (refrigeration) 01772 817100

DayMark (labels)
020 7987 2286

Food Horizon (electronic logging) 01737 845590

Paxar (labels)
01279 786000

E&R Moffat (serveries) 01324 812272