An Allergen Control Plan should address the following considerations for a food

An Allergen Control Plan
should address the following considerations for a food
manufacturing facility:
Supplier Review/Monitoring
The product contains natural ingredients like wheat flour, sugar,
salt, ginger, garlic,
Food manufacturers should obtain copies of product or
ingredient formulations, specification sheets
or certificates of analysis (COA’s) from suppliers of raw
ingredients. When reviewing
specifications, you should look for formulations that list
ingredients without the sub-listings. For
example: marshmallows may contain eggs, or soy sauce may
contain wheat. You should verify that
your suppliers have their own Allergen Control Plan.
OFP Developing an Allergen Control Plan
Revised 9/2019 2
Plant traffic flow
Review product flow through the production process that will
occur operationally in the plant. For
example, look for overhead conveyors that cross one another
or cross over exposed products. If
working from a shared site look to see who had previously
used the space before your own
processing.
Raw material storage and color-coding systems
Store all allergenic foods or ingredients derived from these
foods in an area that is secluded or
removed from non-allergenic materials. If this is not
possible, require that incoming material pallets
are shrink wrapped to contain dust and to prevent other
cross-contamination opportunities such as
leakage from torn bags.
Allergen identification is also a useful tool for your firm.
All raw materials that are allergens should
be labeled with a tag that states “ALLERGEN.” This can also
help avoid substitution mistakes (i.e.,
wheat flour for soy flour). A color-coded tag may also be an
option. It is a good idea to place color coding charts throughout the plant’s
production area for easy identification by plant personnel.
Store allergenic compounds on the bottom of racks or nearest
to the floor to avoid spilling of
allergenic ingredients to items below.
Dedicated scoops, utensils and bins used for specific
ingredients also assist in keeping allergens
segregated.
Production scheduling and cleaning
There are two main methods used to control allergens in the
plant. The first method involves
producing all allergen-containing as the last product on a
production line. If all products
manufactured contain the same allergen, a label declaration
is enough to contain the allergen.
However, if only one product produced contains an allergen,
run that last product last. If one
product does not contain an allergen, but the rest of the
products do, run this product first after a
complete wet cleaning procedure or perform a wet cleaning
procedure between the allergen containing product run and
non-allergen-containing product run.
Example: A bakery will use wheat as one of its main
ingredients. If wheat is included as an
ingredient in every item manufactured and is declared on
every label, it is not very likely that wheat
is an allergen concern for this bakery. However, other
products made in the bakery may contain
walnuts or soy flour. Any breads or bakery products
containing walnuts or soy flour must be
produced last to avoid cross contamination.
The second method used for controlling allergen
cross-contamination is to implement a wet
cleaning procedure prior to or following the run of
allergen-containing product on a particular line.
When opting for the wet cleaning method, first assess the
food items that are processed on shared
equipment. An example is peanut butter cookies, pecan
cookies and oatmeal walnut cookies. All of
these would probably be mixed in the same mixer and baked on
the same sheets. Each product
contains a different allergen, necessitating the
implementation of scheduling or cleaning
procedures. It is important to note that each tree nut is a
distinct and individual allergen. Do not
schedule all tree-nut containing products together without a
wet cleaning procedure in between.
OFP Developing an Allergen Control Plan
Revised 9/2019 3
Rework
When using reworked products, always add “like into like.”
Reworked products should always be
labeled with tags that indicate which products contain
allergens. The reworked products containing
allergenic ingredients must be stored in areas separate from
those products that do not contain
allergens. Utensils should be color-coded for use with allergen-containing
products. If at all
possible, rework product back into the same production run.
Evaluation of program effectiveness
Changes in raw materials, suppliers and customer demands
result in the need for continuous
reevaluation of the effectiveness of the Allergen Control
Plan. Incorporating routine auditing
practices, both for your suppliers and your own in-plant
operations, is a key component in verifying
that the plan is working correctly.
Label review policies
Develop a system for maintaining labels that are placed on
foods containing allergens in easy to
identify areas. Discard old label, as they can cause an
error in the future. Conduct a thorough
review of the current recipes and match them with the labels
used. A good idea to manage your
firm’s Allergen Control Plan would be to have a binder that
lists raw material specification,
formulations and the finished product label. When a raw
material ingredient statement changes, you
would then be able to cross-reference with the finished
product labels and understand what
products and labels would be affected by the change.
Frequency of Allergen Plan review
Allergen Plans should be reviewed during an annual HACCP
validation. Items should include
specific allergen policies (scheduling, utensil usage,
cleaning, raw ingredient segregation and color
coding for example) that are in effect in the plant.
Documentation and reviewing the documentation
The documents created should state what you are going to do
within your own plant environment.
Essentially say what you are going to do, do what you say
and prove it with documentation. If it is
not documented, it is not considered done. For example,
production schedule and sanitation checkoff sheets must be filled out and
reviewed by a manager (signed and dated) to complete the records
for the allergen policies.
Employee education
Allergen education may be easily incorporated into good
manufacturing training periods. As
always, you should document the employees that attended as well
as the materials conveyed, the
date of the training and the trainer for your firm’s recordslergen Control Plan

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should address the following considerations for a food appeared first on blitzarchive.com.