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Chefiko

Hygiene procedures for delivered food

Version of 15 October 2026

Every Chefiko chef who cooks at home and delivers agrees to follow these procedures. They set out the basic food-safety practice expected in your kitchen and on the way to the customer. They don't replace your legal duties as a food business operator.

  1. 1. Personal hygiene and illness

    Wash your hands with soap and warm water for at least 20 seconds: before you start, after touching raw meat, fish or eggs, after touching rubbish, and after using the toilet.

    • Wear clean clothes or an apron, and tie back long hair.
    • Cover cuts and sores on your hands with a waterproof dressing, and wear a glove over it.
    • Don't cook for customers while you have vomiting or diarrhoea, or for 48 hours after it stops.
    • Don't cook for customers while you have an infected wound, a skin infection on your hands or arms, or a fever.

  2. 2. A clean kitchen

    Clean and disinfect worktops, chopping boards and equipment before you start and after each task.

    • Keep pets out of the kitchen while you cook for customers.
    • Keep food covered and off the floor, and keep the kitchen free of pests. If you see signs of pests, stop cooking for customers until they're dealt with.
    • Use clean cloths, and change them every day.
    • Keep cleaning chemicals away from food.

  3. 3. Raw and cooked food kept apart

    Raw food can carry bacteria onto food that won't be cooked again.

    • Use separate boards and knives for raw meat or fish and for ready-to-eat food, or wash them thoroughly between uses.
    • Store raw meat and fish covered, on the bottom shelf of the fridge, below cooked and ready-to-eat food.
    • Wash your hands after touching raw food and before touching cooked food.

  4. 4. Temperatures

    Use a food thermometer to check temperatures.

    • Keep chilled food at 5 °C or below, and frozen food at −18 °C or below.
    • Cook meat, poultry and eggs until they are steaming hot all the way through (at least 75 °C in the centre).
    • Keep hot food above 63 °C until you pack it.
    • If you cool cooked food, cool it within 90 minutes, then put it in the fridge.
    • Tell the customer how to store and reheat each dish: reheat until steaming hot all the way through, and only once.

  5. 5. Delivery

    The food must stay safe until the customer has it.

    • Pack food in clean, closed containers made for food.
    • Carry hot and cold food separately, in insulated bags or boxes. Use ice packs for cold food.
    • Hand the food over within 2 hours of it finishing cooking or leaving the fridge.
    • Whoever delivers keeps the food covered and away from anything that could contaminate it.

  6. 6. Weekly meals for several days

    When you deliver a week of meals, some dishes are eaten days after you cook them. These rules keep them safe until then.

    • Label every container with the dish, its allergens, the cooking date and a use-by date.
    • Chilled food must be eaten within 3 days of the cooking date. Set the use-by date no later than that.
    • Freeze any meal that will be eaten later than that straight after cooling it, and label it “frozen on” with the date.
    • Carry chilled food at 5 °C or below and keep frozen food frozen solid until it arrives, in a cool bag or cooler with ice packs.
    • The cooking time you set in your quote includes cooling and packing.
    • Use clean, food-grade containers that close. You choose the containers; arrange any returns with the customer.
    • When you hand the food over, tell the customer to put it in the fridge straight away (frozen meals in the freezer), to eat it by the use-by date, and to thaw frozen meals in the fridge.

  7. 7. Allergens

    Tell the customer which allergens each dish contains: in the booking chat before the delivery, and on a label on each container. Check the allergies and dietary needs on the booking before you cook.

    • The allergens to check include peanuts, tree nuts, crustaceans and molluscs, fish, eggs, soya, sesame, wheat and gluten, milk and dairy products, mustard, celery and sulphites.
    • If you can't make a dish safe for a customer's allergy, tell them before you cook.

  8. 8. Records

    Keep a simple daily log, on paper or on your phone, for 3 months:

    • fridge and freezer temperatures, checked once a day on cooking days;
    • when you cleaned and disinfected the kitchen;
    • for each delivery: the date, the dishes, when cooking finished and when the food was handed over.

  9. 9. If something goes wrong

    If a customer tells you they fell ill, or you find a problem with food you delivered (for example a wrong label, or food that wasn't kept cold), tell the customer straight away and tell Chefiko support at support@chefiko.com.

    Keep any leftover food and your records for that delivery.