Pearlyn Chan (16)

3.1 provide 1-3 pictures that illustrate the hygienic aspects (both positive and negative) of the food stall. Identify the aspects and add captions or descriptions. AND 3.2 state hygienic aspects of the stall. Explain why they are good / bad practices. Elaborate potential food safety problems related to the cleanliness issues or lack of hygiene standard.

The display pastry case

(Food hygiene aspect)

The temperature of the pastry case is in the danger zone (5 - 60 ) which promotes the growth of microorganism such as Clostridium perfringens, hence it is noting a good practice of food hygiene.  The increase in temperature could have been due to the frequently opening of the case to pick up foods that are displayed there. Although they offer to heat up the foods, some customers do it not wish to heat the food up which may result in them ingesting the bacteria that has grown on the food product, causing in foodborne illness.

Food handler cutting a croissant without cutting board

(Food hygiene & preparation aspect)

The food handler is using disposable gloves to hold the food. This is a good practice as it reduces the risk of cross contamination. If gloves were not used in this case and the risk of transferring microorganisms such as Staphylococcus aureus increase which may result in the consumer contracting foodborne illness. However, there is no cutting board placed underneath the food. Using a cutting board to cut would be safer than free hand cutting as it minimises the risk of injuring oneself which may result in absentism of employees in some serious cases.

The cover for the grab and go fridge remains open even when there is no customer picking up food. This is a bad practice and it increase the risk of the temperature of the fridge entering the temperature danger zone which promotes the growth of microorganisms.

3.3 grade (A,B,C,D) the premise using the given checklist

Total points is 134/180 which resulted in 74.4%, grade B

3.4 Recommend at least 2 improvements for a better grade

To address the situation pointed out in the first picture, food spread out into different fridges to reduce the amount of foods items so that it would be quicker to bring the temperature down if the temperature reaches the temperature danger zone

In point 2, the employees can place a cutting board and cut the food on it instead of cutting it free hand to prevent injury or accident to the employees

For the issues pointed out in picture 3, the grab and go refrigerator could make it such that the cover is a sliding glass door so more customers would close the fridge. Another idea could be to place a sign over the plastic cover to remind customers to pull down the plastic or employees could do a frequent check of the cover is down or not.