Cooling Logs: Documenting the Two-Stage Window

Why cooling is the most failed control point

Cooling is where most operations lose food and most candidates lose points, because the rule has two deadlines and only one of them is intuitive.

Stage 1: 135 F to 70 F (57 C to 21 C) within 2 hours.
Stage 2: 70 F to 41 F (21 C to 5 C) within 4 additional hours, 6 hours total.
If food has not reached 70 F in 2 hours, reheat it to 165 F for 15 seconds and restart the cooling process, or discard it.
Methods that work: shallow pans, ice-water baths, ice paddles, blast chillers, portioning into smaller containers.
Never cool large stockpots at room temperature, and never stack hot containers in the walk-in.