Maryland Administrative Code

.08 Manufacturing Practices for Acid Food Canning — Repealed.

.09 Process Controls in Low Acid and Acidified Food Canning. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. The canning process is monitored and controlled as necessary to ensure the food's safety, stability, and shelf life; B. The cook time, cook temperatures, and pH of each batch o…

.10 Labeling and Marking of Containers. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Canned food is conspicuously and prominently labeled or marked with the following information: (1) The common name of the food; (2) The list of ingredients in descending order of prominence by weig…

.01 Definitions. A. In this chapter, the following terms have the meanings indicated. B. Terms Defined. (1) “Back” means to remove a crab's outer shell. (2) “Boiled” means cooked by boiling in water that is bubbling rapidly, greatly agitated, and at a temperature of 212°F at sea …

.02 Incorporation by Reference — Repealed.

.03 Compliance with Other Chapters. A. The person-in-charge shall process crab meat and design, operate, and maintain a crab meat plant, its facilities, and equipment in compliance with this chapter and COMAR 10.15.04 and 10.15.10. B. If a conflict occurs between the requirements…

.04 Licenses. A. In order to operate a crab meat plant, a person shall obtain a food processing license pursuant to the provisions of: (1) Health-General Article, §21-305, Annotated Code of Maryland; (2) COMAR 10.15.04; and (3) This chapter. B. The Department shall specify on a f…

.05 Plant Facilities. A. The person-in-charge shall ensure that the equipment and facilities needed to process crab meat in accordance with the requirements of this chapter are provided and maintained in a sanitary and working condition. B. The person-in-charge shall ensure that:…

.06 Plant Sanitation. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Individuals in the plant: (1) Practice good personal hygiene; (2) Are excluded from working with food when the individuals are sick with an illness that is transmittable through food; (3) While working with food, wa…

.07 Equipment. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Processing equipment is: (1) Designed to provide even and effective processing; (2) Provided with instrumentation to allow process control, monitoring, and verification; (3) Durable and impervious to water; (4) Maintained …

.08 Processing Practices. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Crab meat is processed using sanitary practices, process controls, and a HACCP plan in compliance with COMAR 10.15.10; B. A process used for crab cooking or pasteurization is at least equivalent to a scheduled p…

.09 Unit Processing Operations — Cooking. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Live crabs received at the plant are stored in a manner that enhances the crab's survival and prevents decomposition; B. Crabs are steamed using a standardized process: (1) For a heat lethality e…

.10 Unit Processing Operations — Picking and Packing. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Cooked crabs are transferred to the pickers in containers dedicated to that purpose; B. For cooked crabs that are refrigerated before picking, within 3.5 hours after the crabs are rem…

.11 Unit Processing Operations — Repacking. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Crab meat is repacked only in a licensed picking plant; B. Repacking does not occur except when written approval for the repacking is given by the Department, based on a review of a written pro…

.12 Unit Processing Operations — Pasteurization. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. When crab meat is picked in one plant for pasteurization at another: (1) The crab meat is transported in the final container; (2) A temporary cover that effectively protects the crab meat …

.13 Unit Processing Operations — Storage. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. After being picked and packed in ice, blast chilled, or otherwise cooled in a sanitary and effective way, fresh crab meat is kept in ice or in an ambient air temperature of 40°F or less; B. Excep…

.14 Labeling and Marking of Crab Meat Containers. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. The information required on a container of crab meat is marked by: (1) Embossing; (2) Imprinting; (3) Lithography; or (4) Another method approved by the Department based on its: (a) Durab…

.15 Bacteriological Standards. A. The person-in-charge: (1) Shall ensure that crab meat is processed to meet the bacteriological standards set forth in this regulation; and (2) May not distribute crab meat that does not meet these standards. B. To establish whether compliance is …

.01 Scope. This chapter: A. Governs food service facilities in Maryland; B. Along with COMAR 10.15.04, 15.04.01, and 15.11.11, establishes the standards for the control of Salmonella Enteritidis in shell eggs and egg-producing chickens as part of a program jointly administered by…

.02 Definitions. A. In this chapter, the following terms have the meanings indicated. B. Terms Defined. (1) “Acceptable” means agreeable to the use or presence of equipment or a practice when standards are not developed or when developed standards are inappropriate, because the a…

.03 Incorporation by Reference. A. In this chapter, the following documents are incorporated by reference. B. Documents Incorporated. (1) 21 CFR, as amended; (2) 9 CFR, as amended; and (3) 21 U.S.C. §343, as amended.

.04 Food Supplies and Sources: General. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Food served to the public is: (1) Wholesome and free from contamination; (2) Not adulterated; (3) Safe for human consumption; (4) Obtained from an approved source; and (5) If in packaged form, labe…

.05 Eggs and Egg Products. A. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: (1) Only clean, whole Grade A or higher grade eggs with shell intact and without cracks, or pasteurized eggs or egg products, are used; (2) An invoice or other equivalent record is obtained from the supplier fo…

.06 Food Protection During Storage, Service, and Transport. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. At all times: (1) Food is: (a) Not adulterated; and (b) Protected from contamination during storage, preparation, display, service, and transportation; (2) The internal temperat…

.07 Food Protection During Outdoor Preparation and Service. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. During the use of outdoor cooking equipment, such as a barbeque grill, at a food service facility: (1) Equipment: (a) Is used only at the food service facility for service to pa…

.08 Use of Time-Only with Potentially Hazardous Food. A. The approving authority may approve the use of time-only, rather than time in conjunction with temperature, for food protection as set forth in §B of this regulation. B. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: (1) Before us…

.09 Food Preparation — Temperature and Cross-Contamination Control. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Food temperature measuring devices are: (1) Used to monitor the temperature of potentially hazardous foods; (2) Graduated and accurate within plus or minus 2°F; (3) Cali…

.10 Food Preparation — Cooking. A. Except as provided in §§B—D of this regulation, the person-in-charge shall ensure that potentially hazardous food is cooked to the minimum internal temperature and for the specified holding time as follows: (1) Chart 1. Summary of Minimum Cookin…

.11 Food Preparation — Cooling and Reheating of Potentially Hazardous Foods. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. A potentially hazardous cooked food’s internal temperature is cooled from 135°F to 70°F within 2 hours and from 70°F to 41°F or less within an additional 4 hour…

.12 Food Labeling. A. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: (1) Except as specified in §B of this regulation, each item of packaged food has a label containing the following information: (a) The common name of the food or a descriptive identity statement; (b) If made from two o…

.13 Food Protection from Poisonous or Toxic Materials. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Except for packaged poisonous or toxic products offered in their unopened original containers for retail sale, only poisonous or toxic materials needed to maintain sanitary condition…

.14 Personnel Health and Sanitation. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. As set forth in COMAR 10.06.01.06E, a food handler does not serve or handle food intended for public consumption if the food handler: (1) Has any of the following diseases: (a) Diarrhea caused by Enta…

.15 Food Equipment and Utensils. A. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: (1) Except as provided in §§A(2) and (14) and B of this regulation, food equipment meets one or more of the following design standards: (a) National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) or equivalent sanitation ce…

.16 Cleaning and Sanitizing Equipment and Utensils. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Food contact surfaces of equipment and utensils are effectively cleaned and sanitized by: (1) Removing soil and food particles by one or more of the following: (a) Flushing; (b) Soaking…

.17 Storage and Handling of Cleaned Equipment and Utensils. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Contamination of food-contact surfaces of cleaned and sanitized equipment and utensils is prevented by handling: (1) Cleaned spoons, knives, and forks by the utensil's handles o…

.18 Control of Sanitary Facilities. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Potable water is: (1) Obtained from a water supply system that complies with Environment Article, Title 9, Annotated Code of Maryland, and COMAR 26.04.04; and (2) Meets the standards of quality specifi…

.19 Garbage and Rubbish Disposal. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Garbage is stored in the following ways as applicable to the facility: (1) In containers that: (a) Are sufficient in number to hold all of the garbage that accumulates between periods of removal from the…

.20 Vermin Control. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. A food service facility may operate with its outer doors and windows open unless, while the food service facility is operating with the outer doors or outer windows open, the approving authority: (1) Finds evidence of…

.21 Building — Floors, Walls, and Ceilings. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. A floor and floor covering is kept: (1) Clean; and (2) In good repair; B. The floor in a food preparation, food processing, food storage, utensil washing, dressing or locker, toilet, and walk-i…

.22 Building — Lighting and Ventilation. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: A. Light fixtures, decorative material, and similar equipment and material attached to walls or ceilings are kept clean; B. Lighting provides artificial light at: (1) 50 footcandles at a surface wher…

.23 Building — Cleanliness and Operations. A. The person-in-charge shall ensure that: (1) The facility and parts of the property associated with the operation of the facility are kept: (a) Clean; and (b) Free of litter and rubbish; (2) Traffic through the food operation and utens…

.24 Food Manufacturing in Food Service Facilities. A. A person who is licensed to operate a food service facility may manufacture food for sale or distribution as provided in §§B, C, and E of this regulation. B. The person-in-charge shall ensure that before a food is manufactured…

.25 Special Food Service Facilities. A. For a special food service facility that handles only potentially hazardous food that remains in the original container or wrapping and that does not prepare, wrap, or package the food at the facility, the person-in-charge shall ensure that…

.26 Excluded Organizations. A. Pursuant to Health-General Article, §21-304(a)(2), Annotated Code of Maryland, a volunteer fire company or bona fide nonprofit fraternal, civic, war veterans’, religious, or charitable organization or corporation that does not serve food to the publ…

.27 Farmer's Market, Bake Sales, and Cottage Food Business. A. A cottage food business may offer for sale the homemade foods specified in §B of this regulation when the foods are: (1) Made in a private home kitchen; and (2) Offered or sold only in the State: (a) Subject to the re…

.28 Licenses. A. The approving authority shall require a farmer to obtain a producer mobile farmer's market unit license as specified in COMAR 10.01.17 and 10.15.04 for the sale of a farm product at a farmer's market or at a public event that is not: (1) A raw agricultural produc…

.29 Food Service Facility Inspections — General. A. The person-in-charge shall permit a representative of the approving authority to: (1) Enter a food service facility at a reasonable time for the purpose of making inspections to determine compliance with this chapter; and (2) Ex…