Freezing bones and meat

hi, can anyone help with the following querie?
We are currently in the process of trying to distribute frozen products in Scotland. Is it possible to store raw bones with fresh chicken and cooked products? The raw bones are wrapped, boxed then wrapped again. The chicken is stored in bags and then boxed again. The cooked products are securely packaged in bags and then boxes again. I was unsure of whether these products can be stored together. The products do not come in frozen they all come in fresh. They are also stored in the same freezer but seperated. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I don't like to see an unanswered question, so I'll give you a BUMP Highland Chick.

Can anyone assist?

I have not seen a problem with storing such things in the same freezer. Products should be clearly labeled and segregated by pallet. If pallets are stacked or racked, do not store raw above cooked. Always place cooked product on top.

Dear Highlind chick,

Apologise for ignorance but am not quite sure what "raw bones" means. There is a business in bones ?? For pets ??

No experience chicken but in the seafood business, it is IMEX conventional to use dedicated freezers for (fully) cooked products, for obvious reasons. Subsequently cooked and non-cooked items are geographically segregated in cold store.

Do you mean the process is an air blast freezer followed by a cold store or what ?

Rgds / Charles.C

Dear Charles,

The bones are used for making sauces in catering units.

"Apologise for ignorance but am not quite sure what "raw bones" means. There is a business in bones ?? For pets ?? "


Hi Charles,
The raw bones are lamb, beef, chicken and veal bones which we freeze and then defrost and use to make stocks, sauces and jus. The freezer is located outside and is a stand alone one which is used to keep our products in until distributed or until needed to produce products. It also stores frozen stocks, sauces and terrines. Products are frozen in a blast freezer and then placed in this freezer for storage.

If everything is properly stored then do you think this would be ok?

Many thanks for everyones help.

Dear Highlind chick,

So everything is being done in one freezer ?
And you are producing cooked rte chicken yourself from raw chicken ? this normally requires a segregated process IMEX. maybe i am misunderstanding.

Rgds / Charles.C

Hi, no we take in raw poultry which is reworked but not cooked. We do have cooked lamb and chicken in sauces in the freezer also. Basically in the freezer i have:
raw bones - for stocks
raw poultry - to be distributed
stocks, sauces & jus - to be distributed
sauces, some containing meat - to be distributed
soup - to be distributed

This is all in one big long freezer, if items are stored on pallets, boxed and pallet wrapped and segregated then is this okay or am I required to use a seperate freezer? Thanks in advance.

Dear Highlind chick,

Thks for the details. If you hv a product(s) flow chart, this might also clarify.

The answer depends on what you are actually doing and what your declared final distributed products are. IMEX the basic food processes involved (ignoring defrosting steps) are normally something like this -

Process1 (non-RTE) - Raw product initial > processing > raw product final > freezer (unit1) (ca -40degC) > packaging > cold store (unit2) (ca-18degC)

Process2 (RTE) – Raw product initial > processing > cooking > fully cooked product final > freezer (unit3) (ca-40degC) > packaging > cold store (unit2) (ca-18degC)

Normally, in process 2, the process steps from cooking onwards are required to be physically separated from all other factory operations with raw items. But the final frozen products may be held in the same unit (=unit2) separated by location area.

It sounds like your cooked final products are following some other flow path, eg all processing is lumped together in the same space and you have one final unit (ie unit1 = unit3 = unit2) running at ?? degC. If so, this sounds not so good to me with respect to both processing and “storage”. If all yr final products are classified as “raw” for consumer purposes, the non-standard aspects may not ultimately matter and other people's comments will apply. If fully cooked RTE products are involved, the details probably will matter.

I hope I’ve not misunderstood too much, a lot of variations are possible.

Rgds / Charles.C