Prepare Food Safely
Controlling hazards during preparation
Preparation is where cross-contamination and temperature abuse most often occur. Candidates must understand cross-contamination (pathogens moving from raw to ready-to-eat food via hands, boards, knives, cloths, benches or drips), temperature control during cooking and cooling, and personal hygiene. Use separate colour-coded boards and utensils for raw and ready-to-eat food, or clean and sanitise between tasks. Wash hands before starting, after handling raw food, after the toilet, after touching your face or phone, and after handling waste.
Cooking, cooling and reheating
Cook poultry, stuffed meats, rolled roasts and minced meat dishes to at least 75°C in the centre. Cool cooked food quickly, ideally from 60°C to 21°C within 2 hours and then to 5°C within a further 4 hours, using shallow containers, small portions, ice baths or blast chilling. Reheat to at least 75°C, and reheat only once.
Traps that appear in questions
- Assuming gloves remove the need for handwashing. They do not; gloves get contaminated like hands.
- Washing raw poultry. Splash spreads bacteria; cooking kills them.
- Thawing then refreezing without cooking, or refreezing thawed food generally.
- Using the same cloth for benches and hands, or storing cloths in sanitising solution incorrectly.
- Tasting food with a utensil and returning it to the pot, or using bare hands for ready-to-eat food when utensils are required.
- Believing a visual check proves food is cooked. Use a calibrated probe.
Worked example / rule of thumb
You are making chicken sandwiches and a raw chicken salad at the same station. Rule of thumb: raw and ready-to-eat never share a surface, a board or a knife without a full clean and sanitise in between. Prepare the ready-to-eat items first, or use separate colour-coded equipment, and wash hands after touching raw chicken.