9 replies to this topic

[jaredkkrischel]

We are having an issue witour policy on butter. We have to "temper" the butter before we can use it because at refrigerated temperatures the butter cannot be used. The butter is too hard when it is cold and we have to warm it up a bit before we use it. To do this, we put it in a non-refrigerated warehouse until it reaches about 65 degrees F. We then use the butter, but the issue is when we don't use an entire pallet of butter during the production run. We currently put the unused butter back into the warehouse and refrigerate it.

Our auditor was not too fond of this, but called and asked her friend, a dairy expert. the expert said that there is no food safety risk, but there is a quality issue. The butter could bcome rancid and have an off taste and smell in the cookies. We do a taste test on our products every day, which should mitigate this issue.

Now, we need some documentation that shows that the way we handle our butter has no risk to food safety. Does anyone have documentation of research that proves this "theory"?

[JesLyn]

http://www.fda.gov/F...s/ucm094159.htm

Try this link to the U.S. FDA website. I hope this helps!

[Martinblue]

Dear Jaredkkrischel,

I imagine you must have given some shelf life to Butter once you put for tempering. i would suggest send out butter for micro sampling, maybe once a month at the end of shelf life, to prove there is no food safety issue.

regards

Martinblue

[gelato]

We are having an issue witour policy on butter. We have to "temper" the butter before we can use it because at refrigerated temperatures the butter cannot be used. The butter is too hard when it is cold and we have to warm it up a bit before we use it. To do this, we put it in a non-refrigerated warehouse until it reaches about 65 degrees F. We then use the butter, but the issue is when we don't use an entire pallet of butter during the production run. We currently put the unused butter back into the warehouse and refrigerate it.

Our auditor was not too fond of this, but called and asked her friend, a dairy expert. the expert said that there is no food safety risk, but there is a quality issue. The butter could bcome rancid and have an off taste and smell in the cookies. We do a taste test on our products every day, which should mitigate this issue.

Now, we need some documentation that shows that the way we handle our butter has no risk to food safety. Does anyone have documentation of research that proves this "theory"?

[gelato]

set up titratable rancidity value--that is a benchmark value.

[jaredkkrischel]

Thanks a lot Martinblue! It was exactly what I was looking for

[Ntg]

make a risk assessment of the product

[agwanda]

We are having an issue witour policy on butter. We have to "temper" the butter before we can use it because at refrigerated temperatures the butter cannot be used. The butter is too hard when it is cold and we have to warm it up a bit before we use it. To do this, we put it in a non-refrigerated warehouse until it reaches about 65 degrees F. We then use the butter, but the issue is when we don't use an entire pallet of butter during the production run. We currently put the unused butter back into the warehouse and refrigerate it.

Our auditor was not too fond of this, but called and asked her friend, a dairy expert. the expert said that there is no food safety risk, but there is a quality issue. The butter could become rancid and have an off taste and smell in the cookies. We do a taste test on our products every day, which should mitigate this issue.

Now, we need some documentation that shows that the way we handle our butter has no risk to food safety. Does anyone have documentation of research that proves this "theory"?

Dear Jared,

I concur that there will be a quality issue if the butter stays in the same condition(65F) for a longh period of time. Thus as mentioned, there will be aspects of rancidity leading to a high FFA value as well as effects on spreadability.

IMO depending on your usage or production plans, can you only allocate a quantity that will be utilized within a specified period depending on your recipe so that you do not expose the rest of the lots to quality risks? In the same regard, if a lot goes bad, have a procedure for handling the non-conforming butter-which is part of a Food Safety Management System Requirement.

From your foregoing explanation I do not know whether you manufacture the butter or purchase it as part of your ingredients. If the former is the case then you can process the butter into ghee( but a procedure for these should be claerly documented).

Regards,

Agwanda

[andrewmachon]

We use butter for spreading on bread to make sandwiches. In the past the factory have melted it in the microwave ! But I'm not happy with this process for obvious reasons. We have tried a water bath and this has given reasonable results.

 

Does anyone in the group have any other suggestions for "warming" butter from 4oC to around 20oC so that it can be spread onto bread ? Any remaining butter is always thrown away at the end of the day.

Any help would be really great ! Thank you

[Scampi]

pull the butter out before leaving the day prior, should be absolutely fine overnight for tempering