Bhilai

The huge cauldrons, dal tanks and other kitchen utensils are first washed in warm water to remove soiled particles, sterilised in hot water, scrubbed with sanitiser and then cleaned in hot water for complete cleanliness. 

The measures taken for maintaining the quality of food are:  

• Training the staff to maintain proper hygiene; 
• Sterilising the utensils to make them pathogen free;
• Testing the raw materials based on specified quality parameters;
• Monitoring taste and texture of the food;
• Storing raw materials hygienically to prevent from contamination;
• Taking COA and Form E from suppliers to statistically determine the good processes;
• Conducting supplier audit; 
• Monitoring ORCP of vegetables and CCP of cooked food;
• Monitoring temperature of the food till it is served; 
• Administering vaccination and medical check-up of the kitchen staff.

Solid wastes are used to prepare fertilizers, preventing their flow through municipal pipelines 

The measures adopted for food safety are:  

• Monitoring the schools and ensuring on-time delivery of meals;
• Recording loading and unloading time;
• Taking feedback from schools daily; 
• Taste and texture monitoring; and
• Temperature monitoring.

The kitchen follows a standard Food Safety Management System; and  
Conducting Internal Audit, MRM and Mock Recall strategies

Quality assurance is implemented in the all the three stages: pre-production, production and post-production

During pre-production, cleanliness of the kitchen and equipment's, inspection as well as rejection of raw materials, preventive maintenance, and chlorination of vegetables is done.

During production, personal hygiene of the workers comes first. Those having infectious diseases are not allowed, tobacco chewing or eating inside the kitchen, touching raw materials and cooked food with bare hands are prohibited. The vegetables and lentils are cleaned thrice before cooking. Maintaining critical control points and regular cleaning of floor is a must.

During the post production process, steam sterilisation of the 304 stainless steel vessels, labelling the lids with batch number and quantity, monitoring  the  cleanliness of the delivery vans before loading the food, temperature monitoring of meals in schools, school inspection and also feedback forms are provided to the schools.  

Raw materials are procured from approved suppliers who provide the COA and Form E Certificates. For analysis, the raw materials are sent to Ahmedabad food lab and also to the NABL accredited lab. 
 
 Supplier Selection, Supplier Qualification, and Supplier Ratings 

Supplier Selection: First, the supplier of a raw material is selected who qualifies the supplier audit approval.

Supplier Qualification: If all the necessary documents like ISO certificate, Agmark Certificate, Test reports, COA, Cost index, delivery performance, and quality of product are available with the supplier then the supplier is qualified. 

Supplier rating: It is done on four parameters mainly food safety index, quality index, cost reduction index, and on-time delivery.    

• In-house raw material specification; 
• Moisture metre; and 
• Adulterant test lab

Several kaizen initiatives were adopted for continuous improvement in the kitchen. Some of the initiatives are:

• New rice cleaning polisher and bowler replaced old rice cleaning machine;
• Iron catcher magnet is placed inside the rice polisher;
• Locks are installed in all delivery vehicles;
• Stainless steel sludge tank is used for collecting solid waste;
• Iron woks and burners were replaced with stainless steel wok and burners;
• Stainless steel drainage grills replaced the iron grills;
• Industrial lights replaced tube lights;
• Rice washing machine replaced the manual process of cleaning; and
• Pressure jet has been fitted for cleaning of stains in cauldrons.

The recipes are standardised as per the feedback received from the schools. A separate food safety and quality team tastes every item and separate samples are kept aside.