Rapid cooling of shell eggs

Rapid cooling and storing eggs at 45 degrees F is one of the procedures req uired to minimize pathogen hazards in shell eggs. Laboratory and commercial tests showed that forced-air cooling techniques can cool packaged shell eg gs to 45 degrees F in 2 to 4 hr. Forced-air cooling is fastest when eggs ar e packed in cartons wit view windows or fiber trays. Cartons should be orie nted parallel to air flow for shortest cooling times. Room-cooling of eggs in non-vented cases requires more than 2 days, but cases with 5% side wall vents reduce cooling time to a range of 22 to 28 hr. room-cooling in wire b askets (15 doz capacity) can be done in 10 hr. Rapid cooling slows the rate of albumen quality loss and reduces weight loss compared wit conventional slow cooling. We observed no effect of rapid cooling on reducing shell stre ngth nor on causing an increase in shell cracks compared with slow cooling. Rapid cooling did not appear to affect Salmonella enteritidis penetration of sound eggs.