Advanced planning saves your loved ones a lot of trouble and reduces the potential for legal disputes that could arise after death. Transporting a body across state lines isnât an issue that has been highly litigated and therefore attorneys arenât necessarily the best experts to provide practical advice in this area.
Food starts to spoil when the temperature rises above 40 degrees. After food warms to that temperature, you have just two hours in which you can either return it to cold conditions or cook it. In the fridge, produce will survive most power failures, but dairy products should be discarded if they smell or taste sour.
Cooling Foods Safely. One of the leading causes of food-borne illness is improperly cooled food. Cooked foods that are to be stored need to be cooled to below 41Â°F/5Â°C as quickly as possible. This should be completed within four hours, unless you use the two-stage cooling method. In the first stage of this method, foods must be cooled to 70Â°F/21Â°C within two hours. In the second stage, foods must reach 41Â°F/5Â°C or below within an additional four hours, for a total cooling time of six hours. The proper way to cool hot liquids is to place them in a metal container in an ice water bath that reaches the same level as the liquid inside the container.