Recipe: Safe Food Handling for a Catered Event

Hi Susan,

The car won't be cold enough to hold food in for hours. All the prepared foods should be considered perishable (even mashed potatoes). Also, putting too much in a small refrigerator may make it hard to maintain the proper temperature. Here is info for you:

Catering From Home Safely

Keeping Food Cool During Cool Handling

Catering Magazine Article: Unsafe buffets, stations, invite unwated bacteria

Washington State Food & Beverage Workers' Manual
Page 14 - Temperature Control

Food Safety at Temporary Events

I hope that's a help!

Betsy at Recipelink.com

IN REPLY TO:

Friday night I'm catering a big party. I need to know how to keep some of the stuff cold, or does it have to be kept cold?

two large trays of pasta, cold, Italian-type dressing. One tray pasta and cooked chicken, one tray pasta and veggies. I can leave off the dressing until I reach the party space, so it will be just pasta/veggies/cooked chicken.

two large trays rice dish, this will be served hot. One tray rice and cooked chicken, one tray rice and veggies. No sauce, just using the flavored rice packets.

Now I can store two trays of something in my office fridge. I'm also making a large tray of Scotch eggs (picture a meatball with a hard-cooked egg inside). Various other things in my fridge, large bucket of crab dip and pudding for tartlets. will be making most of this stuff on Thursday, party Friday night.

Also have to make a tray of mashed potatoes and mashed turnips. That has to be in the fridge.

Now my question is how cold does the rice and pasta dishes have to be? Can I keep them overnight say, in my car? It's quite chilly here in NY< was snowing a bit today.

No dish has anything really perishiable, except the dip and mashed potatoes (sour cream).

So I'm really just asking about the rice and pasta dishes. What would you do? Could I make them late Thursday night and keep them at room temp?

Thanks.

Susan, NY