Ideas for controlling Allergen Dust
We manufacture two edible products in a small space. One product, a brownie, contains a number of allergens, the other has no allergens. The brownie mix consists of a dry powder that is super fine and kicks up dust even from something as simple as opening the bag. Our kitchen is COATED in this dust and not surprisingly all of our allergen swabs are failing. The team tries to clean but removing all of this particulate would be nearly impossible. Does anyone have any tips, insights, suggestions? Unfortunately using a dedicate space to produce the brownies would be impossible.
Thanks as always for your help!
Can the second product include allergens on it's label without disrupting its marketability?
If there's no restriction on allergens on the second product you could "reformulate" it to include all the problem allergens... One egg in 200 pounds of batter will probably not make a difference in it's outcome......
We manufacture two edible products in a small space. One product, a brownie, contains a number of allergens, the other has no allergens. The brownie mix consists of a dry powder that is super fine and kicks up dust even from something as simple as opening the bag. Our kitchen is COATED in this dust and not surprisingly all of our allergen swabs are failing. The team tries to clean but removing all of this particulate would be nearly impossible. Does anyone have any tips, insights, suggestions? Unfortunately using a dedicate space to produce the brownies would be impossible.
Thanks as always for your help!
Hi elizabeth,
The first line of Post 2 is probably a common, albeit technically/consumer unsatisfactory, escape route.(= "May Contain" Labelling.)
This is what I do. We have hundreds of products, and every product contains all of the allergens in my building. It makes life SO much easier, and I highly recommend it.
Even still auditors make silly demands. Like I still have to have dedicated allergen scoops, etc. They can't explain why, only that I need to, lol...
You could consider time segregation as part of your controls - so the product without the allergens would be manufactured after the weekly deep-clean (with cleaning verification in the form of allergen swabs) and the product that includes the allergens could be manufactured after that.
I've seen situations where airborne allergens from fine powders need to be given time to settle onto surfaces before cleaning, and the action of cleaning disturbs the area to the extent that the allergens are re-dispersed and further time needs to be allowed before a second cleaning operation. If you run a few experiments, you can validate the cleaning routine required in order to repeatably and reliably achieve clear allergen swabs.
From a compliance perspective, I would view the intentional addition of allergenic materials into a recipe as deliberately increasing risk where a 'may contain' statement would have served the same purpose... But ultimately, as long as it's accurately reflected on the labelling it's all the same legally. The key thing is to make sure the provision of information to consumers is a true and accurate reflection of the product composition and risk.
Also, if your swabs are failing, you need to change your cleaning SOPs until you can get clean swabs after cleaning. Definitely.
Hi elizabeth,
The first line of Post 2 is probably a common, albeit technically/consumer unsatisfactory, escape route.(= "May Contain" Labelling.)
Thanks, this is what I've read-- that it's kind of a cop out to use 'may contain' labels. But I do see this done often...