Shelf Life Mircobiological Risk Assessment

Hi All, 

I have recently been seeing in retailer COP's in the UK they require a Microbiological Risk Assessment conducted on Shelf life Trials. 

I am really struggling to get my head around what is meant by this, and how the answer will help with a shelf life trial. As far as I know we can test the product for so many days and get to a defined point where we deem it at safe life. Start, middle and end x 2 mirco + organoleptic. 

I am thinking that this mirco risk assessment would be used to determine what the target life should be and if a CCP should be considered? 

So, any help or example of a microbiological risk assessment (for shelf life) would be most helpful? 

Thank you. 

Hi All, 

 

I have recently been seeing in retailer COP's in the UK they require a Microbiological Risk Assessment conducted on Shelf life Trials. 

 

I am really struggling to get my head around what is meant by this, and how the answer will help with a shelf life trial. As far as I know we can test the product for so many days and get to a defined point where we deem it at safe life. Start, middle and end x 2 mirco + organoleptic. 

 

I am thinking that this mirco risk assessment would be used to determine what the target life should be and if a CCP should be considered? 

 

So, any help or example of a microbiological risk assessment (for shelf life) would be most helpful? 

 

Thank you. 

It's a very, very, wide topic.

Can you provide some context, eg -

Product type, eg yoghurt

packaging type, eg vac pack

Storage procedure, eg chilled

typical shelf life, eg 1 week, 1 year

It's a very, very, wide topic.

 

Can you provide some context, eg -

 

Product type, eg yoghurt

packaging type, eg vac pack

Storage procedure, eg chilled

typical shelf life, eg 1 week, 1 year

Hi Charles, 

This is for Cheese, it would need to consider a few types of cheese: Soft mould ripened, Semi hard and Hard, Packaging would be MAP for Hard cheese and Wrap Bead seal for Mould Cheese, All chilled and typical shelf life for soft mould cheese is around a month, hard cheese around 3-6 months once cut and packed. 

Thanks

Hi Charles, 

 

This is for Cheese, it would need to consider a few types of cheese: Soft mould ripened, Semi hard and Hard, Packaging would be MAP for Hard cheese and Wrap Bead seal for Mould Cheese, All chilled and typical shelf life for soft mould cheese is around a month, hard cheese around 3-6 months once cut and packed. 

 

Thanks

Hi LD,

Thks above.

Cheese totally outside my knowledge base however, generically, the micro. aspect  typically relates to shelf life as below.

Shelf life is initially required to be determined as whether to be based on (a) safety or (b) quality.

(1) afaik, for chilled, non vacpack/non-MAP, RTE foods it's usually (a) and particularly with respect to limiting values of  L.monocytogenes.

(2) for  MAP, RTE foods UK has Regulatory conditions, see -

https://www.food.gov...acuum-packaging

and

UK,vacpac,MAPguide.pdf   478.85KB   66 downloads

(especially see the decision tree/pg10)

For (1) see -

CFA_Micro_testing_interpretation_2nd_ed.pdf   570.62KB   87 downloads

(may not be latest revision)

(IIRC, a decision tree is also available elsewhere)

The only caveat to the preceding is that I do not know if "cheeses" are for any reason exempted from any of the above. ( i noticed cheddar cheese is discussed in above attached file for[2]).

PS - there are a few cheese micro. threads elsewhere on this form (somewhere).