The Chilled Delivery at 34 Degrees
A caterer receives a chilled delivery at 07:15 on a warm Tuesday. The van's rear doors are open and the outside temperature is already 24°C. The delivery note lists 12 kg of raw chicken breast, 8 kg of cooked sliced ham, and 20 litres of fresh milk. The driver says the fridge unit failed overnight and was only repaired at 05:00. The chicken surface reads 9°C, the ham reads 12°C, and the milk reads 11°C on the caterer's probe thermometer. The driver offers a credit note if the goods are refused. The caterer has a busy lunch for 90 people and no other chicken supplier available until tomorrow.
1. Decide which items, if any, should be accepted, and explain your reasoning for each item.
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The decision must be item by item, because the temperature limits and the risk profile differ.
Raw chicken at 9°C is above the 0–5°C chilled storage range and has been in a failed fridge overnight. Poultry is a high-risk food and the surface temperature may understate the core temperature. It should be refused. The fact that no other chicken is available until tomorrow is a commercial pressure, not a food safety justification; the correct response is to change the menu or source an alternative.
Cooked sliced ham at 12°C is also outside the chilled range and is ready-to-eat, so there is no later cooking step to kill bacteria. It should be refused. The credit note is irrelevant to the safety decision.
Milk at 11°C is above the recommended chilled range for milk, which is typically kept at 5°C or below. The duration above temperature is unknown, so it should be refused unless the caterer can establish a documented, short time out of temperature and the milk is to be used immediately after a risk assessment. In practice, refusal is the defensible choice.
The overall reasoning is that a failed fridge, unknown time out of temperature, and readings several degrees above range mean the cold chain cannot be verified. All three items should be refused and the refusal recorded with temperatures and times.
2. What should the caterer do about the 90-person lunch, and what records should be made?
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The caterer should not serve the refused items. The lunch must be replanned around food that is verified safe, for example by using frozen chicken that can be defrosted under controlled conditions if time allows, or by changing to a dish that does not require chicken. The menu change should be agreed with the client and, where relevant, the reason explained.
Records should include the delivery time, the vehicle condition, the product temperatures, the batch or date codes, the decision to refuse each item, the name of the person making the decision, and the credit note reference. The refusal should be reported to the supplier in writing so the failed fridge is investigated.
If any of the refused food had already been accepted and stored, it would need to be segregated and discarded, and the storage area checked. The caterer should also review whether the supplier is reliable and consider an alternative supplier. The key principle is that the cold chain must be demonstrated, not assumed, and documentation is what proves the decision was made deliberately.