Which Chopping Block ?

In the UK at present it is necessary, in a commercial kitchen, to use colour coded chopping blocks. 6 of them.
Red : raw meat.
Blue : raw fish.
Yellow : cooked meat.
Green : salad and fruit.
White : vegetables.
Black : bakery and dairy.

So, when making a ham, tomato and cucumber sandwich one must :
Cut and butter the bread on the black board. Cut the ham on the yellow board. Cut the cucumber on the, well, it’s a vegetable so it could be the white one, and we often think of it as a salad, so maybe the green one ? The tomato of course is a fruit so that will be on the green one.
Then we assemble our sandwich, add a little salt and pepper perhaps and place the second slice of bread on it.
Now, which board do we use to cut it in half ?

Oh, and by the way, under the The Food Safety (General Food Hygiene) Regulations 1995 there is a penalty for getting this wrong :

Any person guilty of an offence against these Regulations shall be liable—
(a) on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum;
(b) on conviction on [sic] indictment, to a fine or imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or both..

3 responses

  1. Certainly it would be cheaper to use one board; it would also cause more food poisoning. Would you prefer compulsory liability insurance such that everyone poisoned could claim their loss in utility back instead?

  2. Cross contamination between cooked meats and raw meats is indeed a problem. Or at least a potential problem. In the 20 years I spent i the food business I never saw anyone stupid enough to use the same board for both without washing it.
    BTW, in the US one can use a single wooden board. In the EU one must use the above 6 plastic ones. Is there a major difference in the incidence of restaurant caused food poisoning ? I don’t know but I would be interested to.

  3. I gather making a salad out of vegetables is illegal then.

Leave a Reply

Discover more from Tim Worstall

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading