HACCP In Brief ( Food Safety Management Tool)

What is HACCP?
HACCP (pronounced "hass-ip") is the simple but effective way to ensure food safety. HACCP stands for the "Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points" system. HACCP is a systematic approach to identifying and controlling hazards that could pose a threat to the safe production of food.

HACCP has been in use in the food processing sector for some time but it is only since 1998 that the hospitality industry/sector and the retail sector have been obliged by law to implement a HACCP style food safety system in their business.

The original HACCP System
The first ever HACCP system was developed by the Pillsbury Company in response to a request by NASA to provide an alternative method of food safety control. Up to 1959 NASA had used sampling/testing at each stage of the production process to ensure that the foods consumed by astronauts in flight were free from contamination. Unfortunately this often resulted in very little of an original batch of food being available to take into flight when all the sampling was completed. The Pillsbury Company suggested a "preventative control" system as opposed to the "sampling control".

This system would exercise control over:

• the quality of raw materials
• the processing system
• the environment in which the process occurred
• the personnel involved in the process
• the storage and distribution systems.

Essential to the effective working of this system was detailed specification and controls for each stage of the system and effective record keeping for these controls. These records allow clear traceability of each item through the system. This system allows for the tracing of any problems back to source as traceability was and is all important.

Main Components of the HACCP System
HACCP is, first and foremost, a proactive concept. The technique based on it treats the production of food as a total, continuous system, assuring food safety from harvest to consumption. included in this system are purchasing, receiving, storage, preparation, and service. Each of these components is evaluated by principals of a failure analysis. The premise is simple. If each step of the process is carried out correctly, the end product will be safe food. To design a HACCP style food safety system, management and staff must be familiar with the main components of the HACCP system and work these components into their particular food process.

There are 7 main components of the HACCP system:

1. Identify the Hazards.
2. Determine Control Points and Critical Control Points.
3. Set Critical Control Limits.
4. Monitor Critical Limits.
5. Take Corrective Action when monitoring indicates that Critical Limits have not been met.
6. Establish an effective Recording System.
7. Verify that the system is working as planned. 

What are Hazards?
Hazards can best be defined as: "anything that could contaminate food or cause harm to the consumer".

What are CCPs?

CCP stands for Critical Control Points and is defined as a point, step or procedure in which food safety hazards can be prevented, eliminated, or reduced. Examples of CCPs include storage, defrosting, cooking, cooling, hot holding.

What are Critical Limits?
These are the criteria that must be met for each preventative measure associated with a CCP. Critical limits may be set for preventative measures such as temperature, time, visual appearance.

What are monitoring procedures?
Monitoring is a planned sequence of observations or measurements to assess whether a CCP is under control and to produce an accurate record for future use in verification. Examples include:

• Visual Observations
• Temperature
• Time
• pH

What is corrective action?
Corrective action should be in place to deal with any potential hazards that may occur. For example, determining whether food should be disposed. Corrective action should be documented in the HACCP plan.

What is involved in a record keeping system?

• Listing HACCP team members and assigned responsibilities
• Monitor equipment with temperature logs
• Hazard assessment at each step in flow diagram
• Critical Limits established at each step
• Corrective action plans when there is a deviation in policy, procedure or standard
• Temperature recording of food stuffs throughout various process stages

What are verification procedures?
Verification procedures include:

• Establishment of appropriate verification schedules.
• Review of HACCP plan.
• Review of CCP records
• Visual inspections of operations to observe whether CCPs are under control
• Random sample collection and analysis
• Review of modification of the HACCP plan
• Review of written record of verification inspections covering compliance, deviations, or corrective actions taken.

 - Naim KHALID , 11 Jan 2014

beef mixed with horse meat - EU scandal

In one of the bigger food related stories of early 2013, it was reported that horse meat was found in processed meat products labelled as beef in Irish and British supermarkets. In some cases, the amount of horse meat substituted for beef was as much as 100%.

While it’s clearly deceptive for food companies to label a product one thing when it’s actually another, this page will explore what the difference is between beef and horse meat nutritionally.
The ethics of horse meat consumption is a personal matter. And though it’s definitely one you should have a choice in, if you choose to eat cheap processed ‘meat’, it could be argued that you’re not really that concerned with what you’re eating anyway. You’ll see why ahead.

For now, even though it may be distasteful to some, what are the actual nutritional differences between beef and horse meat (assuming just this time that they really are what they are labelled as)?

Calories

According to nutritional data, 100 grams of cooked horse meat contains 175 calories, with 55 of those calories coming from fat.
By comparison, 100 grams of standard ground beef with 30% fat has 273 calories with 164 of those coming from fat.
While you may be able to find processed beef products with less than 30% fat, unless they are specifically labelled (and we’ve seen just how well that works) the fat percentage can be even higher.

Fat Content

Horse meat is listed to be containing only 6 grams of fat per hundred grams, 2 grams of saturated fat and 64 mg of cholesterol. It’s not surprising, with most horses eating more grass than processed grain pellets, that their meat would be relatively low-fat.
Ground beef is listed as having 18 grams of fat in total, with 7 grams of saturated fat and 1 gram of trans fat. Total cholesterol is 82 mg.

Intensive cattle production uses lots of fattening grain pellets as the primary feed and often synthetic hormones to speed up the animal’s weight gain. Cattle fed grain as their main diet will always be much higher in fat compared to those that are grass fed.

Protein

The protein content of horse meat is around 28 grams per 100 grams, making this a high protein food.
Ground beef is comparable, though a little lower, with 25 grams per 100 gram serving.

Vitamins and Minerals

The levels of certain vitamins and mineral in horse meat are quite high. It is a particularly rich source of iron and it also has good amounts of the minerals zinc, selenium and phosphorus and of the B vitamins niacin, B6 and B12.

Ground beef is also considered a good source of iron, though it is significantly lower than horse meat, with less than half the content. Zinc and selenium are higher in ground beef though and it also contains a good concentration of most of the B vitamins.

Should You Eat Horse?

While at truly insignificant levels compared to beef consumption, horse meat is eaten in many European countries like France, Germany and Italy. In specialty butchers across Europe you can find meat from horses sold alongside other more commonly known animal foods.
So should you eat horse meat? If you don’t personally have any moral objections to eating horse and you can find it humanely slaughtered in one of these specialty butchers, then I think the nutritional information on horse meat above has shown it is actually healthier than regular beef.
Unfortunately, horse meat’s nutritional value and what you actually end up with in the vast majority of processed meat products are two completely different things.

The Problem with Processed Meat

The recent horse meat scandal has provided some interesting insights into the way food companies source their processed meat. The horse meat found in the UK and Irish ready meals was originally sourced in Romania and Poland by a Dutch company (this Wikipedia article has the whole twisted tale) and tracing the source of the various different animal parts in a product can be difficult.
A more significant problem though is the potentially dangerous additives used in the manufacture of processed meat products, particularly sodium nitrite which can lead to the creation of carcinogenic substances.

In 2012, the World Cancer Research Fund released a review of over 7000 studies into the dietary causes of cancer. The report said ‘eating even a small amount of processed meats on a regular basis increases our bowel cancer risk’. And on the routinely used additive sodium nitrite, that it can ‘damage the DNA in our cells’.
Another study by the University of Hawaii concluded that regular processed meat consumption increases your risk of pancreatic cancer by 67%. And diabetes researchers at Harvard University have discovered the compounds like nitrites and nitrates in processed meat interfere with the proper secretion of insulin and increase your risk of developing diabetes.

Processed meat has other health issues worth considering too, such as the amount of actual meat in it. Off cuts of the slaughtered carcass that cannot be sold in any other form are generally used and many of us wouldn’t really recognise what’s ground up to make these products as real meat.
In fact, the horse meat found in the frozen ‘beef’ lasagne and ‘beef’ pasta products would have almost certainly been by far and away the highest quality meat in the mix.

Conclusion

If you really are concerned about what you’re eating, you might want to look into just how processed meat is actually made. Many nutritional experts would say whether it is beef or horse meat is the least of your problems if you are eating processed meat regularly.

sanck foods

What is a snack food? “snack” as “a light meal, food eaten between regular meals, food suitable for snacking.” A leftover from last evening’s home or restaurant meal, an afternoon bowl of breakfast cereal or cookies and milk for children returning from school in midafternoon are all properly named “snacks.”

However, what if there are only a few “regular meals” during the day? Scheduling regular meals could be challenging when parents (or a single parent) and children leave home at different times for work and school, especially when lunches are primarily eaten away from home and when activities for the children occupy weekday evenings and sometimes weekends as well. Our society sometimes lacks a structured time schedule for meals. Food is often purchased at drive-through windows and consumed alone in vehicles. Often, office workers take coffee and sometimes microwave popcorn to their desks at lunchtime. Snacks are then a convenient food for people on the go. Snacks are mainly eaten for craving and should not be considered a “meal.”

In general, snacks should have several characteristics, such as being safe and free of hazardous chemicals, other toxic substances and pathogenic organisms as defined by several federal laws and enforced by various agencies. Snacks are typically prepared commercially in large quantities by continuous processes; they are usually seasoned with salt and often with additional flavorings. Current regulation requires that snacks be shelf stable as well, requiring no refrigeration for preservation, packaged in a ready-to-eat fashion, typically divided into bite-size pieces, easily handled with the fingers and may have an oily or dry appearance depending on customer expectations for the specific product.

High Risk Foods

• All cooked meat and poultry.
• Cooked meat products including gravy and stock.
• Milk, cream, artificial cream, custards and dairy produce.
• Cooked eggs and products made from eggs e.g. mayonnaise.
• Shellfish and other seafood.
• Cooked rice.