STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURES
PURPOSE: Thawing is a much slower process than freezing and is usually done in refrigerator. The process would be faster if performed at higher temperature but that would create favorable conditions for the growth of bacteria. During thawing a liquid leaks out from the meat being thawed.
SCOPE: This procedure applies to the pre preparation area employees who handle frozen foods.
KEY WORDS: Refrigerator, Water & Microwave.
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Place frozen product in a tempering room or cooler that is maintained at 50ºF or colder and allow product to thaw or reach desired level of tempering.
2. If the room temperature is greater than 41ºF but not above 50ºF, thawed product must be cooled to 41ºF or colder within 8 hours of thawing.
3. Alternatively, frozen ground beef or whole chickens may tempered or thawed at a temperature greater than 50ºF but not greater than normal room temperature (72ºF).
4. Ground beef portions of at least 1 pound in size may be tempered/thawed for up to 9 hours.
5. Whole chickens of at least 3.7 pounds in size may be tempered/thawed for up to 9 hours.
6. Thawed product must be cooled to 41ºF or colder within 2 hours of thawing.
7. Tempering/thawing conditions warmer than 72ºF must be evaluated to ensure that the pathogenic bacterial growth will not occur on the products.
8. The tempering/thawing product will be monitored on a scheduled basis to prevent product drip and loss of package integrity, and to ensure that product drip does not contaminate other products.
9. The product surface temperature will be monitored and documented on a scheduled basis to ensure that the guidelines listed above are met.
10. When possible, the outer layer of trim and/or pieces being thawed will be removed and refrigerated. This process will be repeated as often as necessary to ensure that the outer surface of the thawing mass is not held for an unsafe length of time at temperatures that could allow pathogen growth.
11. The lot code of frozen product that has been purchased from an outside vendor will be recorded on a batch sheet (or production log) before tempering/thawing for use in product tracking if the vendor institutes a recall.
12.
MONITORING:
1. A designated kitchen supervisor will inspect in the time of thawing the frozen foods to be sure that the all the employee is following this SOP.
2. The designated kitchen supervisor will monitor the core temperature and the time between the thawing and cooking.
CORRECTIVE ACTION:
1. Retrain any employee found not following the procedures in this SOP.