FSAI Level 2 Food Safety Skills cheat sheet

Four hazard classes: biological (bacteria, viruses, parasites, prions), chemical (cleaning agents, pesticides, allergens), physical (glass, metal, bone, pests), and allergenic.

Biological hazards cause the majority of foodborne illness outbreaks; bacterial hazards are the most common biological cause.

Contamination routes: direct (raw to cooked contact), indirect (hands, utensils, surfaces), cross-contamination via drip, and airborne or pest transfer.

Allergenic hazard differs from other hazards: it cannot be removed by cooking, freezing or dilution, so prevention depends on segregation and labelling.

Physical hazards are controlled by foreign-body controls: supplier specifications, sieving, metal detection, X-ray, visual inspection and glass/perspex registers.

Chemical hazards are controlled by approved chemical lists, correct dilution, thorough rinsing of food-contact surfaces and segregated chemical storage.

High-risk foods are those that are ready to eat, high in protein and moisture, and require temperature control: cooked meats, dairy, seafood, rice, gravies.

Cross-contamination risk rises with wet surfaces and high bacterial load; cleaning and drying food-contact surfaces between raw and ready-to-eat use breaks the route.

Hands must be washed before food handling, after using the toilet, after handling raw food, after waste handling, after cleaning, and after coughing, sneezing or touching the face.

Correct handwash sequence: wet hands, apply soap, lather and rub for at least 20 seconds including fingertips, thumbs, between fingers and wrists, rinse, dry with single-use towel.

Hand sanitiser is not a substitute for handwashing; it is ineffective on visibly soiled or greasy hands and does not remove bacterial spores.

Exclusion from food handling applies to anyone with vomiting or diarrhoea, and for 48 hours after symptoms stop; some infections require longer or medical clearance.

Reportable conditions to the manager include vomiting, diarrhoea, fever, sore throat with fever, jaundice, skin infections on exposed skin, and infected cuts.

Cover cuts with a distinctively coloured waterproof dressing plus, where required, a finger stall; report any wound that cannot be covered.

Protective clothing must be clean, changed when soiled, and worn only in food areas; it must not be worn outside the premises or in toilets.

Jewellery, wristwatches, false nails, nail varnish and strong perfumes are prohibited or restricted in food-handling areas because they harbour dirt and create physical hazards.

A food handler returning from abroad with gastrointestinal illness, or living with someone with similar symptoms, must inform the manager before returning to food work.

Bacteria need four conditions to multiply: food, moisture (water activity above about 0.85), suitable pH (near neutral), and time plus temperature in the danger zone.

Generation time for many foodborne bacteria is roughly 10–20 minutes in optimum conditions, so a single cell can become millions within hours.

Spore-formers such as Clostridium perfringens and Bacillus cereus survive cooking; slow cooling of cooked rice, meat and stews allows spores to germinate.

Clostridium botulinum is anaerobic, grows in low-acid, low-oxygen, low-salt environments, and its toxin is destroyed by boiling; spores are destroyed only by high-temperature canning.

Staphylococcus aureus is carried on skin and in the nose; it produces a heat-stable toxin, so reheating does not make toxin-contaminated food safe.

Salmonella is associated with raw poultry, eggs and cross-contamination; it is destroyed by thorough cooking but survives in undercooked products.

Listeria monocytogenes grows at refrigeration temperatures, is dangerous to pregnant women, older people and immunocompromised people, and is controlled by strict shelf-life and temperature control.

E. coli O157 is associated with raw meat and unpasteurised dairy, has a very low infectious dose, and is controlled by cooking to at least 70°C for 2 minutes or equivalent.

Viruses such as norovirus and hepatitis A are not destroyed by cooking at normal temperatures and are controlled by hand hygiene and exclusion of infected handlers.

Danger zone is 8°C to 63°C; minimise time in it, and keep chilled food at or below 8°C (or 5°C for best practice) and hot food at or above 63°C.

Cooking core temperature: 75°C for at least 30 seconds for poultry, rolled joints, minced/chopped meat products and any food cooked for a vulnerable group.

Alternative time-temperature combinations (e.g. 70°C for 2 minutes, 65°C for 10 minutes) are acceptable if they achieve the same lethality.

Cool cooked food from 63°C to 8°C within 90 minutes (or from 63°C to 21°C within 90 minutes, then to 5°C within a further 90 minutes) using blast chiller, shallow containers or ice bath.

Reheating must reach 82°C throughout; reheat only once and never reheat food that has already been reheated.

Probe thermometers must be cleaned and disinfected before and after each use; use a probe with a thin tip, and check calibration in ice water (0°C) and boiling water (100°C).

Freezer temperature should be −18°C or colder; defrost in a refrigerator, in a microwave for immediate cooking, or under running water, never on a warm bench.

Hot-holding equipment must hold food at 63°C or above; display units should be checked with a probe or data logger and records kept.

Date marking: high-risk ready-to-eat foods need use-by dates; after opening or defrosting, follow manufacturer instructions and label with the new use-by date.

Cleaning removes visible dirt and grease; disinfection reduces microorganisms to a safe level; both are needed on food-contact surfaces, with cleaning first because disinfectants fail on soiled surfaces.

Two-stage cleaning: clean with detergent and hot water, rinse, then apply a food-safe disinfectant at the manufacturer's concentration and contact time, then allow to drain or dry.

Contact time matters: a disinfectant applied and wiped off immediately does not achieve its stated kill; follow the label dwell time (often 30 seconds to 5 minutes).

Clean-as-you-go and clean-before-use principles apply to food-contact surfaces, utensils and equipment; schedules should be written and signed off.

Pest control: proofing (screens, door strips, mesh), hygiene (no food or water available), and monitoring (bait stations, sticky traps, fly screens) plus a documented pest control contract.

Signs of pests include droppings, gnaw marks, grease trails, live or dead insects, larvae, webbing, and damaged packaging; report immediately and record.

Pest control chemicals must be stored away from food, in labelled containers, with COSHH-style safety data sheets available.

Cleaning chemicals must be stored in a dedicated locked or restricted area, never decanted into unlabelled containers or food containers.

A cleaning schedule should record what is cleaned, by whom, how often, with what chemical and concentration, and be verified by a supervisor.

Premises must be designed to allow cleaning, prevent pest access and avoid cross-contamination: separate or time-separated raw and ready-to-eat areas.

Food-contact surfaces must be smooth, impervious, non-toxic, corrosion-resistant, and free from cracks, crevices and difficult-to-clean joints.

Equipment must be fit for purpose, maintained and, where required, calibrated; damaged equipment that cannot be cleaned must be removed from use.

Wash-hand basins must be provided, sited to allow handwashing at critical points, supplied with hot and cold water, soap and single-use drying, and not used for other purposes.

Waste must be stored in lidded, leak-proof, easy-to-clean containers, removed frequently, kept away from food areas and never allowed to overflow.

Waste removal must be documented with a waste transfer note or equivalent; waste contractors should be approved and records retained.

Ventilation and extraction must remove steam, fumes and heat; grease filters need scheduled cleaning and records.

Lighting must be adequate and shatterproof, or fitted with diffusers, over exposed food areas to prevent physical contamination.

Drainage must be adequate, trapped and kept clean; backflow prevention and grease traps reduce contamination and pest risk.

HACCP has seven principles: identify hazards, determine CCPs, set critical limits, monitor CCPs, take corrective action, verify, and keep records.

A CCP is a step where control is essential to prevent, eliminate or reduce a significant hazard to an acceptable level; it is identified by a decision tree or expert judgement.

A critical limit is a measurable value separating acceptable from unacceptable, e.g. 75°C core temperature, pH 4.6, or 8°C chilled storage.

Monitoring must be planned, frequent enough to detect loss of control, and recorded with who, what, when and the result; corrective action must record what was done with the affected product.

Verification confirms the HACCP plan works (audits, calibration, product testing, record review); validation confirms the controls are scientifically capable of controlling the hazard.

Records must be legible, dated, signed, retained for an appropriate period (commonly product shelf life plus a margin, often 12–24 months) and available to inspectors.

Prerequisite programmes (cleaning, pest control, personal hygiene, supplier approval, training, maintenance) support HACCP and must be in place before CCPs are meaningful.

Food business operators must identify and review hazards at steps they control, and must be able to show due diligence through documented procedures and records.

Allergen information for non-prepacked food must be available in writing or by clear signposting, and staff must be trained on the 14 named allergens and cross-contact controls.

Training must be relevant to the role, delivered before work begins where practical, refreshed periodically, and recorded with name, date, content and trainer.

Competence is demonstrated by behaviour and records, not attendance alone; supervision is required until competence is confirmed.

A positive food safety culture is evidenced by management commitment, clear responsibilities, open reporting of problems, and resources for hygiene and maintenance.

Staff must know how to report hazards, illness, pests, equipment faults and foreign-body incidents, and must be able to name who to tell.

Allergen training must cover the 14 named allergens, hidden ingredients, cross-contact, label reading and the procedure for customer enquiries.

Records of training, induction and refresher sessions are part of due diligence evidence and should be kept with the HACCP documentation.

New staff and agency staff must receive induction on hygiene, handwashing, illness reporting and allergen procedures before handling food.

Managers should review incidents and near misses to identify trends and update procedures, with changes communicated to staff.

Supplier approval means checking that suppliers have appropriate food safety controls, certifications or audit evidence before purchase.

Specifications should cover ingredients, allergens, microbiological criteria, storage conditions, shelf life and packaging.

Traceability requires records that allow food to be traced one step back and one step forward; batch or lot codes link deliveries to products and customers.

Goods-in checks should verify temperature, packaging integrity, dates, labels, allergens and pest damage, with records of acceptance or rejection.

Rejected or recalled products must be segregated, labelled and disposed of or returned under documented procedure.

A product recall or withdrawal plan must identify who decides, how customers are contacted, how stock is recovered and how effectiveness is verified.

Stock rotation (first in, first out and first expired, first out) reduces waste and keeps within use-by dates.

Supplier and goods-in records are part of the verification evidence for HACCP and due diligence.