Get compliant in 5 steps using this Food hygiene app.

Reasons to go digital with your food safety management

Food hygiene is a significant factor influencing a restaurant’s reputation. By preventing food-borne illness outbreaks and preserving brand reputation, Pilla acts as a layer of protection for your business, making sure that everything is happening correctly. Poor food hygiene standards can lead to a tarnished reputation and loss of business, but with Pilla, you can ensure improved customer experience, brand reputation, and food quality.

As many as 82% of consumers are aware of food hygiene standards in the places they eat out at or buy food from, indicating that food hygiene directly impacts customer decisions. Keeping data in a digital solution massively helps with legal compliance by ensuring the ability to quickly supply data related to HACCP principles, which can reduce potential litigation and fines in the long run. With Pilla, you not only improve your food hygiene practices but also enhance your business reputation by efficiently managing your food hygiene paperwork.

✅ Better practices for a safer kitchen

A safer kitchen is a result of better practices. Pilla helps lower the incidence of food-borne illnesses and protects public health. The app and website is designed with a focus on appealing to non tech-savvy users so that everybody in the kitchen can pick it up and use it quickly.

With Pilla, you as chefs can ensure that your kitchen follows the best practices for food safety when cooking, chilling and cleaning all with the goal of reducing the risk of food-borne illnesses.

✅ Showcasing your commitment to food safety

A commitment to food safety is a commitment to your customers. Pilla helps businesses implement and maintain consistent food safety practices, including effective management of energy consumption. This commitment strongly influences a business’s reputation, demonstrating reliability and professionalism in the eyes of customers and potential partners.

By showcasing your commitment to food safety, you can achieve better business results, protect and improve customer trust, and enhance brand reputation. With Pilla, you can showcase your commitment to food safety and enhance your business reputation as an executive chef or owner.

✅ Paperless record keeping

Paperless record keeping is one of the many benefits of going digital. Pilla’s digitising of food safety checklists clears out file rooms of endless paper, reduces the physical space needed for paperwork, ensures information is stored and readily available through digital records and means no more rummaging through stacks of paper to find that one document.

By using digital hygiene solutions, your business can eliminate the ongoing costs of paper and ink, decreasing waste and workplace clutter. So, with Pilla’s paperless record keeping, you can reduce waste, save costs, and contribute to a greener environment.

✅ Reducing carbon footprint

Going digital is not just about efficiency; it’s also about being eco-friendly. Pilla reduces the need for paper, making it more affordable and eco-friendly. By adopting digital food safety records, your business can lower its carbon footprint.

In fact, paperless food safety documentation can significantly reduce paper usage, helping businesses to have a more positive environmental impact. Adopting digital food safety records can also help a business respond to consumer demand for more eco-conscious practices. With Pilla, you can contribute to a greener planet while ensuring food safety.

Fridge, freezer and dishwasher temperature checks

Maintaining the correct temperatures in fridges and freezers is essential for food safety. The recommended temperature for a refrigerator is at or below 5°C (40°F), and the legal limit in the UK is 8°C.

Freezer temperatures should be -15°C or colder. Setting freezer temperatures to -18°C will help maintain a temperature colder than -15°C. Optimal dishwashing temperature is 55-60°C and the final rinse cycle should achieve a temperature of between 82-88°C. These temperatures ensure that thermal disinfection happens during the cycle.c

Fridge, freezer and dishwasher temperatures should all be monitored and recorded twice a day. Pilla includes pre-made checks for all three of these which can be quickly and easily and added to daily checklists.

[url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/fridge-temperature-checks][u]Record fridge temperatures[/u][/url] [url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/freezer-temperature][u]Record freezer temperatures[/u][/url] [url=https://dishwasher-temperature][u]Record dishwasher temperatures[/u][/url]

Cooked food temperature checks

Food need to be cooked to a temperature which kills bacteria, so that it is safe for your customers to eat. Foods should be cooked to 80°c for 6 seconds, 75°c for 30 seconds or 70°c for 2 minutes. The only safe way to check the temperature of food is using food safe temperature sensors (probes).

As part of your due diligence process, kitchen teams should record a same of these temperature records throughout the day. On Pilla teams do this using the cooked food check template which can be added to any checklist.

[url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/safe-food-temperatures][u]Record cooked food temperatures[/u][/url]

Hot holding food temperature checks

Hot holding temperature checks are crucial to ensure that food maintained in a heated state before serving is safe for consumption. In the UK, the law requires hot food to be kept at 63°C or above to prevent harmful bacteria from growing. Pilla simplifies these checks by providing a template that can be incorporated into daily routines, ensuring compliance with food safety regulations. Regular monitoring with Pilla not only helps in adhering to the law but also maintains the quality and safety of the food served to customers.

[url=https://hot-holding][u]Record hot holding temperatures[/u][/url]

Cooled food temperature checks

Proper cooling of food is a critical step in food safety management to prevent bacterial growth and food-borne illnesses. Foods, particularly those high in protein like meat, poultry, and seafood, must be cooled from 60°C to 5°C (140°F to 41°F) promptly to ensure safety.

The recommended practice is to cool foods to 20°C (70°F) within two hours and then to 5°C (41°F) within the next four hours, making a total cooling time of six hours.

To accurately monitor the cooling process, use a calibrated food thermometer to check the temperature at regular intervals, recording the times and temperatures. Pilla's digital logs can streamline this process, offering templates for cooling records that ensure precise tracking and adherence to food safety protocols. By maintaining proper cooling procedures, you can safeguard your customers' health and uphold the reputation of your business.

[url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/cooling-food-safely][u]Record temperatures and times of cooled foods[/u][/url]

Kitchen cleaning schedules

Keeping a kitchen spotless is not just about aesthetics; it's a critical component of food safety. That's why kitchen cleaning schedules are paramount. They are a structured plan to ensure that every nook and cranny of the kitchen is cleaned at the appropriate frequency, preventing the buildup of harmful bacteria and cross-contamination.

With Pilla, these schedules will be digitised, ensuring that tasks are not overlooked and are completed on time. This systematic approach to cleaning helps maintain a hygienic environment, which is essential for the health of both staff and customers, and supports compliance with food safety regulations. A well-maintained kitchen cleaning schedule can contribute to the longevity of kitchen equipment, saving costs in the long run.

[url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/kitchen-cleaning-checklist][u]Organise kitchen cleaning checklists[/u][/url]

Front of house and toilet cleaning schedules

Ensuring the cleanliness of the front of house and restrooms is not just a courtesy; it's a direct reflection of your establishment's commitment to hygiene and customer care. Adhering to strict front of house and toilet cleaning schedules is paramount in creating a welcoming atmosphere and maintaining a pristine environment.

Pilla's digital scheduling offering a systematic approach to track and verify cleaning tasks here too, upholding the highest standard of cleanliness. Regular and documented cleaning routines not only reassure customers about the hygiene of your dining space but also contribute to the overall health and safety standards, preventing the spread of germs and enhancing the dining experience. With Pilla's help, businesses can ensure that these critical areas are always in top condition, reflecting positively on the establishment's reputation and customer satisfaction.

[url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/bar-cleaning-checklist][u]Organise bar cleaning checklists[/u][/url] [url=https://yourpilla.com/blog/restaurant-cleaning-checklists][u]Organise front of front of house restaurant cleaning checklists[/u][/url]

Issue escalation and correction

Issues will arise unexpectedly, in your industry, that's a fact. Pilla provides a robust system for issue escalation and correction to ensure that any potential hazards are addressed quickly and well documented so that you can show EHO. When a food safety issue is detected, the app not only notifies the responsible manager but also tracks the escalation process to ensure accountability throughout. The correction process is streamlined with Pilla's paper-trail system. This ensures that issues are not only resolved quickly but also that similar problems are less likely to occur in the future.

Pilla's real-time data and reporting capabilities play a crucial role in issue correction. Managers can analyse incidents, track the effectiveness of the corrective actions, and adjust protocols to improve future responses. This continuous improvement cycle is key to maintaining high standards of food hygiene and ensuring customer safety.

✅ Real-time monitoring and alerts

Real-time monitoring can be a game-changer for food safety management. Pilla excels in providing real-time monitoring, allowing businesses to respond quickly to safety issues. This quick reaction is important for maintaining food safety standards and avoiding costly food spoilage.

Pilla users can receive immediate alerts by push notification and take necessary actions to monitor and maintain safe food temperatures. The automatic alerts for temperature breaches and other issues help reduce stock loss and potential health issues associated with improper food storage temperatures.

✅ Accessible data for audits and inspections

Having accessible data is crucial so Pilla uses cloud-based data storage to centralise and streamline your food safety data, ensuring secure and easily accessible records for audits and a full paper-trail and history of safety incidents and issue corrections.

Every piece of data and every comment is logged for future reporting. When an internal or external auditor carries out an inspection, all the details of this data can filtered and presented very quickly. This data will also help your leadership understand which team's food safety compliance is below par. A daily report means that your leadership can quickly view which checklists have been completed on time and which team's have issues.

Choosing the right food hygiene app for your business

Selecting the appropriate food hygiene app for your business is a big decision. Pilla is designed to cater to the specific needs of businesses, offering customisable features, user-friendliness, and cost-effective solutions. It combines advanced features with a simple, intuitive interface to provide a robust, easy-to-use food safety management system.

The choice of a food hygiene app can significantly impact your business’s food safety management. From ensuring compliance with regulations to improving operational efficiency, the right app can make a world of difference. And we believe that Pilla, with its comprehensive features and cost-effectiveness, is the best choice for your business.

It’s important to compare features and functionality when selecting a food hygiene app. Pilla offers customisable checklists that facilitate adherence to specific business needs and compliance standards and pre-built templates to make staff are recording the correct things.

The user-friendliness of a food hygiene app is a key consideration during selection. Pilla’s user-friendly design ensures easy navigation and efficient use during everyday tasks. The app’s customisable user interface is designed to be simple to navigate, making the onboarding process for active users easier and integrating smoothly into a business’s Food Safety Program.

Pilla offers accessibility across different devices, allowing team members to use it efficiently, irrespective of the hardware they have at hand. When selecting a food hygiene app, cost and value should be considered significantly. Pilla is a free app and so is the perfect solution if choice is budget is a high priority for you.