Nitrite residues on Equipment

Hi All,

Looking for some input in relation to Nitrite residues..... we are dry ingredients company making cures/brines. we manufacture these products some with Nitrites and some without nitrites.

we are working to a standard that we clean our machinery down when moving from nitrite containing products to non-nitrite containing products.

given the large surface area of the blenders we swab at different points and pass the machine if we find them to be below 5ppm, if above we go into a re-clean.

we are very careful with not going above these limits, as high nitrites can cause issues with "pinking" of chicken for example.

my question is, are we being too hard on ourselves as this can lead to alot of downtime due to re-cleaning?

any advice or guidance on this topic would be appreciated,

many thanks

I think you're looking at a couple of different factors here...

Do you export to other countries? What are the labeling requirements on nitrites in your country and those you export to? I know they are required to be labeled in the US, so if you have residue in a product that is not labeled with nitrites, it's a problem.

Another is quality - have you done a study to establish the limit at which you re-clean? Or is 5ppm just the indicator limit of your test? When you say "high nitrites cause a problem - is it anything above 5ppm? Or greater?

hi MsMars,

we would only really deal with IRL/UK for the moment, however it is good to know regarding nitrites for America.

it appears to be a tricky one, these limits were set before my time but can find no evidence as to why there is such a low limit on this. the only thing i can think of is the potential "pinking" of chicken which can occur as low as 3ppm.

i think i will need to do some trial work and validation and gradually work my way up on the limits, however i am sure someone put this here for a good reason!

much appreciate your response

thanks

Ken 

will this help by chance?

www.fsai.ie/faq/use_and_removal_of_nitrite.html#use_of

thanks Scampi...it helps but not very specific to my issue at hand.

I have spoken with some experts on this and there are varying opinions...... my best bet i think is to trial and increase the limits of the surface swabs.... only way i can validate increasing the targets without any backing from scientific papers

much appreciated