Vol. XXXI · The Professional Kitchen Plate 6 of 11HACCP, hazard analysis, critical control point, CCP, critical limit, monitoring, corrective action, verification, records, cooking temperature, cooling, two-stage cooling, hot holding, cold holding, food safety management, Food CodeS

HACCP.

"Cook chicken to 74 °C" is a rule. "Probe the thickest piece of every batch, write the reading down, and if it is under 74 °C keep cooking and probe again" is a critical control point.

HACCP was developed in the 1960s by the Pillsbury company with NASA and the US Army to make food for astronauts that would never make them ill, and became the basis of food-safety law worldwide (Codex, 1993). Its seven principles: analyse the hazards (biological, chemical, physical, allergens — XII.1, XII.10); identify the critical control points (CCPs), the steps where a hazard can be prevented, eliminated or reduced to a safe level; set a critical limit for each; monitor it; define the corrective action when it is not met; verify that the system works; and keep records. Everything else — cleaning, pest control, training, supplier checks — is the prerequisite programme that makes it possible.

In a restaurant kitchen the CCPs are mostly time and temperature (XII.6): cooking (poultry and minced meat to 74 °C or 71 °C, or the equivalent time at a lower temperature), cooling (from 57 °C to 21 °C within 2 hours and to 5 °C within a further 4, XII.7), cold holding (5 °C or below), hot holding (57 °C or above, XXXI.7), reheating (74 °C within 2 hours) and, for some dishes, acidification (sushi rice, XXVIII.5). A probe thermometer, a log sheet and a cook who knows what to do when a reading fails are the system. The workshop checks a day's log.

Below: a day's log for a batch of chicken stock and braised chicken: the readings you set for cooking, the two stages of cooling and hot holding, checked against their critical limits (FDA Food Code 2022), with the corrective action for each failure.

What you will learn

State HACCP's seven principles.
Identify kitchen critical control points.
Set and monitor critical limits.
Take corrective actions and keep records.

Workshop

Critical limits (FDA Food Code 2022, as used throughout the course): cook poultry to 74 °C; cool from 57 °C to 21 °C within 2 hours and from 21 °C to 5 °C within a further 4 hours; hot hold at 57 °C or above. Corrective actions follow common Food Code practice.

Measure, write, act

The power of HACCP is that it turns good intentions into numbers somebody checks. A stock that took three hours to fall to 21 °C has spent too long in the range where Clostridium perfringens doubles in minutes (XII.4); no amount of later chilling makes it safe, and the corrective action — reheat to 74 °C and cool again properly, if within the rules, or discard — must be taken and written down. Records are what let an inspector, or the chef, see that the system works every day, not just on the day of a visit.

Setting up a simple kitchen plan: draw the flow of each dish from delivery to service; at each step list what could go wrong and how; mark the steps where a temperature or time must be controlled; give each a critical limit, a way to measure it (probe, timer, pH meter), who checks and how often, and what to do if it fails; check probes in iced water (0 °C) and boiling water weekly (I.4); keep the logs for the period your authority requires, and review the plan whenever the menu, equipment or supplier changes.

At the stove

Make a log sheet for one dish you cook often: its critical steps, limits, who checks, and the action if a limit is missed.

Pillsbury's Howard Bauman, who led the HACCP work for NASA, later persuaded his company to apply it to all its products after glass fragments were found in a batch of baby cereal in 1971 — the moment HACCP moved from space food to everyday food.

Terms

HACCP: Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points.
Critical control point: A step where control is essential to prevent a hazard.
Critical limit: The measurable value that separates safe from unsafe.
Corrective action: What is done when a critical limit is missed.

HACCP: analyse hazards → critical control points → critical limits → monitor → correct → verify → record. In kitchens the CCPs are temperatures and times: cook 74 °C, cool 2 + 4 h, hold ≥ 57 °C or ≤ 5 °C.

Sources

Codex Alimentarius, General Principles of Food Hygiene (CXC 1-1969, revised 2020): HACCP's seven principles — hazard analysis, critical control points, critical limits, monitoring, corrective actions, verification, and records.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Food Code 2022 (sections 3-401.11, 3-403.11, 3-501.14, 3-501.16, 3-402.11 and the definition of time/temperature control for safety food).