Holding Meats at Temperature
Quite often you will be holding foods waiting for the last guest to arrive of for the wife to get off the phone, something like that!
There are some rules to follow to ensure the food you serve is safe.
Keeping food hot
If you need to keep food hot before service, ensure that the food remains hot at 60 °C (140°F) or hotter.
Most Ovens can be set to 50°C as a minimum, so find the sweet spot where the oven will sit between 60 and 65°C (140 to 149°F). Set your oven to temperature, place a bowl of water inside and come back to check the temperature of the water with as temperature probe in a couple of hours. This will tell you how accurate your oven thermostat is.
It takes more than 4 hours for bacteria to multiply to dangerous levels, so there is some leeway.
Cooling foods
If you are cooling leftovers, make sure they drop to 5°C (41°F) within 6 hours.
