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Posted By paul debney
I have a friend who is the pastor of a local church.
At the regular weekly meetings, people will bring in cakes that they have made at home and maybe the odd sandwich or two.
A lady that attends the meeting has frightened him to death (she has her own catering business) with food regulations.
He is now considering stopping anybody bringing home made food into the church and getting people within the church to do food hygiene courses to make cups of tea!
As we say in the Black country 'Doh be so saft'
Has anybody got any case law on this subject, especially civil,I would not think the food regs apply to them because the church is not selling food.
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Posted By holmes1979
Perhaps the lady in question has a hidden agenda.... gain a contract for supplying food to the parish...
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Posted By paul debney
Yes that has been noted, I think it is more of a 'miss know it all' as her business is very successful and the church contract would be a few pounds.
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Posted By CRT
The food safety act defines a "business" as including an institution and does say whether for profit or not, however talk to the local EHO, suprisingly enough, they are generally informative, helpfull and use a modicum of common sense- there is a difference between a catering company and a few friends meeting together and consuming their own snacks.
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Posted By TBC
Is this the end of the great English 'Church Tea Afternoons'? I suppose we could take it that bit further and stop the mother-in-law from coming round for dinner :-)
If the food is being given away between friends or small contributions given to the church, surely there would be no problems. Maybe each and every kitchen in each home should have a hygiene inspection. This before allowing the parishioners to buy the ingredients, bake them, take them to the church, just to give them away or sell for a ridiculously low price something which actually tastes like a cake and not like tasteless supermarket chemical cakes.
I can well remember the days when my granny would bring home some of what was left and we all really enjoyed them – can’t remember being ill - apart from when we ate too much.
I would love to see the newspaper headlines on this one.
As Tel would say - Is it me?
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Posted By Graeme
Sounds to me like the catering lady needs to be taken to one side and humiliated.
Although if you wanted to take it to another level, is a church tea for people attending a service any different to, say the homeless attending the church on an evening where a warm soup or food service is being provided for the unfortunate, which from my interpretation the church would then require a certificate to do.
Wheres the difference in the provision of those 2 services?
There is non apart from the type of people and circumstances for attending the service being provided by the church.
So maybe it does require a certificate for an afternoon tea. Swings & Roundabouts!
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Posted By TBC
Got to disagree with you there Graeme – the parishioners bring the food from home prepared, they don’t prepare it for the unfortunates on the premises. Could make a difference and again it is not for sale. Does that make a difference?
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Posted By Graeme
The certificate relates to areas where food is consumed, handled, waste disposal.... it doesnt need to be cooked on site to qualify for the requirement of certificates, and it doesnt need to be sold, the provision of a service whether profit or non profit falls under the definition of business from what i understand?
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Posted By rjhills
It seems to me that a little common sense should be applied to this situation.
With all the scare stories in the press, and the "bonkers conkers" stories also, it seem that we are in danger as a society of losing the value of our way of life.
As a lad, the church was the hub of our small community, with several well meaning and efficient ladies giving their services to effectively the local community.
One lady of 78 years who I still see, still does all the church flower arranging out of the goodness of her heart, and guess what?,,, she enjoys it and remains active.
Perhaps the vicar should be robust!!! with thr catering lady, and tell her that if she can provide the cakes etc for nowt, she can have the job!!!
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Posted By CRT
Having read the last few threads, i would reitterate my previous comments and add that i work in the EH dept of LA carrying out, amongst other things, food hygiene inspections.
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Posted By Glyn Atkinson
Common sense seems to prevail from wise words from the field of expert knowledge - just what the forum should be about !
If not, send all the cakes and jams to Merv, wean him off that French stuff - Vive l'Angleterre !!
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Posted By J Knight
Just to support what CRT has said. We have numerous charity events around the UK where people bring, buy and consume food for funrdaising. We developed out policy following discussion with EHOs, and a summary of their advice is that we really must avoid high-risk food, such as fresh cream, raw egg, pate etc, but on the whole there will be little of any real risk in a freshly cooked jam tart. The Food Safety Act does apply to any business preparing or serving food, but EHOs aren't interested in killing off fetes and fundraising events, and they really will be helpful,
John
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Posted By Lilian McCartney
Yup, agree with John, that's what our church found.
We had useful advice similar to his. We have monthly brunches, soup, bacon rolls etc and do all the temp testing etc.
Cakes for sale not cream, pancakes and scones brought in from homes, buttered and 'jammed' at church.
Soup made at home, brought in cold and then reheated and temp checked etc
Weekly group for people with addictions very similar.
With all this food we do, is it any wonder I've put on weight?
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