The Washington State Department of Health is releasing helpful resources to prepare for the new Food Code updates.
The Washington State Board of Health in October 2020 updated the Food Code to incorporate the 2017 U.S. Food and Drug Administration Food Code and requests from Washington state stakeholders.
Based on public comment during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic, the Washington State Board of Health chose to stagger the phase-in dates for the new Food Code updates. Some of the updates took effect Jan. 15 and the effective date for the rest of the changes was extended to March 1, 2022.
Here are the sections that took effect Jan. 15 – mostly related to mobile food units:
- Definitions (including the removal of lemonade/beverage stands and certain B&B foodservice from the definition of “food establishment”)
- Receiving temperature of freshly-made rice noodles
- Pet dogs allowed indoors at food establishments with very limited foodservice
- Mobile food unit requirements and restrictions
- Mobile food unit changes needing plan review
- Mobile food unit application requirements
- Mobile food unit standard operating procedures
- Mobile food unit temperature control of foods
- New section: Mobile food unit commissary usage
- New section: Mobile food unit commissary exemption
- Mobile food unit warewashing requirements
- Mobile food unit required posting of business name and operating locations
Read all of the changes to the Food Code here.
