Author Topic: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.  (Read 4054 times)

bill shaver

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location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« on: March 09, 2015, 01:03:35 PM »
Just out of Curiosity how far from a cow stable must your kitchen be & can it in anyway be part of the barn, i'm located in new york state.

Sailor Con Queso

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #1 on: March 09, 2015, 02:52:09 PM »
That is up to your state inspectors.

Kern

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #2 on: March 09, 2015, 05:06:27 PM »
Just out of Curiosity how far from a cow stable must your kitchen be & can it in anyway be part of the barn, i'm located in new york state.


Several years ago the FDA and Washington State shut down a 15+ year old artisan cheese operation for a lot of alleged violations.  I am posting a link below to the FDA's press release regarding this matter.  If you Google "Estrella Farms listeria" and study some of the news articles you can learn a lot about some of the things you should avoid running a cheese making operation in conjunction with family farm.  I have no facts about this case other than what is in the public record but after a careful reading of the available information can see culpability on both sides.  The farm is still there selling other products but has not restarted the cheese operation.

http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm224990.htm

bill shaver

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #3 on: March 09, 2015, 07:02:39 PM »
Was the Liysteria contamination pathogenic, did not see that in any article...yeas have heard that fda inspectors can be picky for no reason...they just act above their mandate...& why!

Kern

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #4 on: March 09, 2015, 11:10:59 PM »
Was the Liysteria contamination pathogenic, did not see that in any article...yeas have heard that fda inspectors can be picky for no reason...they just act above their mandate...& why!

If memory serves some listeria was found on the "cheese prints" on the rough hewn wooden shelves.  My point in posting the link was not to place blame but to point out some of the potential problems that can ensue when the cheese making facility is located on the farm with the dairy cows when the wall separating the two operations is insufficient.  Be sure to click on the link in the press release titled "FDA Inspection Report".

One of the resellers of this farmstead cheese told me that Mrs Estrella likely would have been fine had she taken care of the problems noted in the inspection report and worked with the FDA and Washington state folks to resolve them.  She decided to "push back" and fight them and ultimately it cost her a $500,000 cheese making business.  Bad idea!   :-\









 

WovenMeadows

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #5 on: March 10, 2015, 01:02:39 AM »
Inspectors told me when I inquired (I think!) that the "plant" should not open directly into any part of the barn, stable, parlor, or milkhouse, though they could share walls and building. So, basically, either open only to the outdoors (a clean area - not a barnyard!), or a foyer or entry type room (which may itself open to, say, the milkhouse). You'd also want to be aware that any air vented into the plant is fresh, not coming from the barn or barnyard.

SOSEATTLE

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #6 on: March 10, 2015, 01:08:48 AM »
Was the Liysteria contamination pathogenic, did not see that in any article...yeas have heard that fda inspectors can be picky for no reason...they just act above their mandate...& why!

There were no illnesses reported in this situation. The sad thing was what Kern indicated, how the creamery responded to the situation. They refused to do a recall and ultimately the Feds came in and shut down/seized everything. It is much better to cooperate with the authorities, not fight back.


Susan

bill shaver

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #7 on: March 10, 2015, 03:41:51 AM »
Ture one should take heed as it results in you being totally shut down, they are inspecting for food saftey & not comming over to talk about the weather. Points well taken , fresh air from outside, an air lock between barn & kitchen, and of course a drain system seperate from milk house to waste collection..Proper would be a building seperate from the barn. not insurmountable efforts , just must be done durring construction to ensure barn is seperate from kitchen.

Kern

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #8 on: March 10, 2015, 04:56:35 AM »
Ture one should take heed as it results in you being totally shut down, they are inspecting for food saftey & not comming over to talk about the weather. Points well taken , fresh air from outside, an air lock between barn & kitchen, and of course a drain system seperate from milk house to waste collection..Proper would be a building seperate from the barn. not insurmountable efforts , just must be done durring construction to ensure barn is seperate from kitchen.

Washington State is very supportive of the artisan cheese making business.  There are actually a couple of seminars each year where the state will take potential business owners through the process of how to design the place, what is allowed and what isn't, the application process, whey disposal, labeling, etc.  Furthermore, they will sit down individually and help the cheese maker work though the design.  The goal according to the state is to make sure everything is approved before a shovel goes into the ground.  They want no surprises.   :)   

bill shaver

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Re: location of your industrial kitchen to make cheese & butter.
« Reply #9 on: March 10, 2015, 01:00:05 PM »
Finnally got to a terminal where I'm not whitlisted...yes am at my job on the high seas, its a federal job with defense dept, anyway , read the article about the listeria at that esterella farm, sad, no one elaborated where it came from & my limited understanding listeria on the farm can come from almost anywhere, from bad silages, dirty cow stables, damp feeds, etc, etc, nothing to take lightly from what i was shown in aprentiship at MacDonald College  in late70's. the dairy farms i worked back then milked as few as 25 and as many as 60, mostly Jerseys, some Holstein-Fresian cattle  & aryshires as well.

Many a farmer pointed out to me many things about raw milk and how it could make you very ill, i experienced it working at a freestall barn prior, and got deathy ill, opened sluces at both ends , put me in hospital witha medicated drip, it was bad, so much the milk board insp went & looked and pushed the issue on that farm, never went bak, can you figure!

Yes the Food inspectors are there to help, but you have to wonder sometimes, they feed the anti govt retoric which is nothing but baseless fear of the govt in all aspects. But a big question is how are artisnal cheese & butter producers treated in europe! Are they held to same standards as the large scale processing plants. This is what I see in USA & Canada since the Listeria debacle at maple leaf foods a few years back.

Another question Why are they not treating the small Artisnal cheese & butter producers whith some degree of latitude as their product is different.