Egg Storage and Allergens
Hello,
We are currently storing all of our allergens in a single temperature controlled room. Someone brought to my attention that egg has to be stored by itself due to the salmonella risk. To my understanding there is only a storage hierarchy that needs to be observed. Can I get some advice? On that room we store, milk, bread and coconuts. Also if you could back up your advice with reference.
Thank you,
im not sure what you mean by a storage hierarchy.
unpasteurized egg products should not be stored above other products or where they would not contaminated other products as you stated. (allergen and salmonella)
https://www.gcca.org...tore-shell-eggs
all products need to be stored in a manner that they do not contaminate other products. that is why allergens are stored segregated and you don't store raw meats above other products as well. see - 21 cfr 117
Why would you store bread in a refrigerator? it was my understanding that certain reactions that make the bread appear stale faster.
??? not sure on the salmonella risk of the eggs...........it's not going to jump from item to item?
If it's liquid egg, it should already been pasteurized, so zero risk.........if you're using shell eggs, well that seems silly to me
Not sure on the cool/cold storage for bread OR coconuts?????
More info please
The best practice is to separate allergen profiles as best as you can. It is also recommended that you store the non-allergenic ingredients above those with allergens. This way, if product drops or drips it would not contaminate the products underneath it.
In my facility, this means storing cucumbers on the top shelf. Then imitation crab (pasteurized) in the middle shelf. And raw fish on the bottom shelf.
Cucumbers would not contaminate the imitation crab. And imitation crab would not contaminate the raw fish (same allergens).
Unfortunately for you, all of your products have different allergen profiles.
- Bread: wheat, egg, milk?
- Egg: Egg
- Milk: Milk
- Coconut: Tree nuts
If you had to store one above another, I would put milk on the top and bread below it. Then probably coconuts above eggs since eggs will have a kill step of some sort.
To be completely sure, you could also source some NSF-approved dividers to keep distance between cases/packages.
As mentioned above, your eggs are most likely pasteurized, meaning Salmonella should not be a concern. But if you have raw eggs, then you would not want to store them above a product that will not be further processed to kill pathogens, or in any other manner where they could contaminate another product in case of spillage. Agreed with the others regarding no or less allergens stored above materials that contain allergens not found in the items above them.
Presumably, safety-wise, it depends on (haccp) Risk Assessment and preferred degrees of Risk Aversion.
the allergenic risk (R) due cross-contamination of adjacent vertically (and horizontally?) stored, disparate, allergens is theoretically Likelihood x Severity.
It seems to me that in many situations, eg "well-packed" product / efficient transfer operations, R = (Very Low x Very High)(VL x VH). The Risk can then be Significant or non-Significant depending on whether the Risk matrix is structured to be strongly or weakly Risk-Averse, eg whether Likelihood or Severity is prioritized. Since customer usage is unlikely to eliminate inadvertent allergens, Regulatory bodies /publications seem to traditionally opt for the "Strong" as far as allergens are concerned hence the typical storage rules.
afaik, the basic storage situation for microbiological zero-tolerant pathogens tends to be similar, eg RTE above NRTE
In contrast, IMEX, the preferred risk aversion for Process haccp micro. risk matrices in NRTE foods is often the opposite of above, ie VL x VH > Non-Significant hazard since customer usage, ie cooking, is assumed to eliminate vegetative pathogenic species.