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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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 Posted:
Feb 18, 2009 - 01:03 PM |
 
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| Post subject: Be Cautious with Frozen Food Shoping |
City Shop, Gubei - Home of the Ancient $120 USA Frozen Turkey (now sadly AWOL)  once again appears on the radar, this time overloaded chest freezers.
Last night I was at City Shop Gubei and spotted overloaded chest freezers. If you look at the back wall of a supermarket chest freezer you will see a "Load Limit" line in which food must be stored below otherwise it will not be hard frozen and can thaw.
Almost every chest freezer was overloaded to some extent (photos) and I could see condensation (water droplets) in food with clear wrappings such as imported bagels, french fries and the food was not hard frozen but soft to the touch.
Closer inspection of food in clear wrappings below the load limit line some were found have been partially thawed then re-frozen with characteristic condensation ice crystals - again the imported frozen bagels. 
I grabbed my camera from the car and took photos and when one of the staff told me photos were not allowed I said I need to complete my frozen food violation report pointing to the load limit line and then to all the food stored above it and water droplets inside the wrappings.
He let me continue to take photos and alerted other staff who quickly sprung into action by distributing the soft frozen food below the load limit line. I pointed out that this food was already partially thawed and is now no good for sale - one woman staff member got annoyed and indicated it didn't matter.
Food that is temperature abused will spoil rapidly as evidenced by off-odours, off-flavours, off-colour, and/or soft texture.
This is not the first time, there was a similar issue with frozen food at City Shop Huahai rd (Times Square) in 2004. I worked across the street and almost every day I grabbed a sandwich for lunch and was able to follow the proceeding.
The chest and upright freezers were broken with water dripping on the inside as they were at room temp and completely thawed food were still for sale. When the freezer was repaired the thawed food was refrozen. Of course the repaired freezer broke again and the food thawed again and when the freezer was repaired again the food froze again. This actually happened a few times - and once again I took photos... (I am what I am  )
In between the freezer repairs I saw meat stored in the drink fridge which is above 4C and not suitable for meat. I also spotted mould on some of the frozen food in clear wrappings - imported bagels (again).
Of course I complained to management and eventually they removed the food and to their credit expressed appreciation in letting them know what was happening. I advised that must conduct spot inspections from a head office level frequently so they can maintain their promised level of quality as proudly advertised.
I am not "China Bashing" with this post that is not the intention. I wan to alert shoppers to be aware of what you are buying and for City Shop and others to be aware that we expect safe quality food as per their promise.
I suggest when shopping be more observant of what you are buying, check dates, quality and if something seems amiss tell the manager and or post it here so something might be done about it. We are all paying a premium price for this food and so we are entitled to be secure that the seller is strict in following safe handling procedures and fulfilling their advertised promises in quality. |
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Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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yu888
Board Deity
Joined: Jan 25, 2003
Posts: 19241
Location: ZhongShanParkArea SH
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Feb 18, 2009 - 01:11 PM |
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J_European
Raver
Joined: Jan 10, 2009
Posts: 483
Location: inland
Status: Offline
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Feb 18, 2009 - 01:12 PM |
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Good observation. Never thought of that before, but I guess it is definitely worth keeping in mind next time I'm at the frozen food section.
Thanks |
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Don't try to confuse me with facts! |
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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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July 04, 2009 - 02:02 PM |
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Last Thursday the same chest freezer was not working for what ever reasons.
Most of the frozen food was either partially thawed or in the case of the bagels completely thawed with the temperature reading of 9C which is even NOT acceptable for refrigerated food!
Reddish brown liquids from the frozen foods was seen on the bottom shelf of one the freezers - the one facing the lift.
All that food ought to be thrown out - will they do it? HA, right!!
So everyone check the cartons for water damage and excessive ice crystals in packaging and DON'T buy it if it looks suspect. If you bought anything that was not good TAKE IT BACK! Do you want your children eating bad food? |
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Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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zoolander
Barker
Joined: July 01, 2008
Posts: 175
Status: Offline
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July 04, 2009 - 02:21 PM |
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i hope you can go to the news instead than doing it here... it will be chaos in the super market once the news report this...
i think most people dont know much about frozen food. theres many stuff
that people need to know. i once dint know about it till i work for a reefer system.
good luck people in eating frozen food.... |
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Mr Totomolo
SuperStar
Joined: June 21, 2008
Posts: 1512
Location: Shanghai & Taipei
Status: Offline
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July 04, 2009 - 07:54 PM |
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Baically, in China (hummm in Taiwan too), nobody should buy frozen food.
Even when the display freezers are loaded correctly, nobody has the simplest idea about what is the cold chain.
And before the chest freezers are loaded, often the food containers are moved out of the walk-in deep freeze storage, left on trolleys for hours at the will and schedule of the supermarket workers.
To be fair, this is not the sole mistake of City Shop; Carrefour has a very bad reputation also , and all over Asia (in Taiwan, I have a friend who got a terrible food poisoning, 7 days in hospital, with a food thawed and refrozen after the big earthquake of 1999).
Same for expired selling dates, although for some products like the coffee, it is not really important; supermarket managers hate to throw away food.
One last thing: I did not know it until one day I asked for chicken legs in the Century supermarket, because the display window was empty: the guy went to take the chicken legs in the deep freezer...
My wife used to buy the chicken wings by 10 and then place some of them in the freezer compartment at home as we thought that they were fresh chicken legs.
Now we buy only what we will eat in the next day
My guess is most meats are frozen and then thawed to be sold ; just look at the quantity of liquid in the PE tray holding your meat next time |
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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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July 05, 2009 - 10:53 AM |
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^ I agree that its not just City Shop - Carrefour and others have the same issues.
However...
City Shop is not meant to be equal with Chinese supermarkets, they are supposed to be superior to what you find in the common supermarkets. They state on their web site
"We dedicate to stringent quality standards." (Really?)
Signs are everywhere to remind shoppers of their high quality standards.
Facta Non Verba, deeds not words City Shop.
It is apparent that City Shop is simply a common Chinese supermarket decorated like a western supermarket and is cleaner, aside from that there is no difference except you pay more - a lot more!
Years ago (2004) when I worked near the Times Square City Shop on Huai Hai Rd. Everyday I would get a sandwich from them and I noticed many poor food handling methods - freezers not functioning well so partially thawed food, meat that was thawed and put on display and then PUT BACK into the freezer (As what Toto commented on) meat stored in a drink fridge with blood dripping on other food stored there, vacuum packed sausages that expired and then repacked and so on. It was like Faulty Towers the episode with the health inspector!!
I complained to the management and then by email to head office. They were apologetic and promised to improve and while it did get better for a while they quickly went back to their old habits. When you complain the staff are thinking YOU are the one who is wrong and you are disturbing them.
Now years later with many complaints nothing has changed meanwhile expats come to City Shop thinking "Oh look its a western supermarket" not knowing it only LOOKS like a western supermarket.
Caveat Emptor, let the buyer beware. |
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Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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canuckian
Rocker
Joined: Aug 12, 2007
Posts: 666
Status: Offline
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July 05, 2009 - 11:16 AM |
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that's why I always select the foods from the most bottom/deepest section of the freezer. |
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cantcheckemailnopw
SuperStar
Joined: Dec 27, 2006
Posts: 1481
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July 05, 2009 - 11:30 AM |
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City shop @ portaman: 2 weeks ago I was buying packaged cheese, all the cheese was very soft and obviously not been at a refrigerated temperature. |
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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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July 05, 2009 - 12:00 PM |
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I wonder if China even has food safety inspectors who randomly check retail food shops for correct refrigerated and frozen food temperatures and food handling? If there are they really suck at their jobs. (should we be surprised though?) |
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Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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monalisalee
Veejay
Joined: May 10, 2005
Posts: 2019
Location: Shanghai
Status: Offline
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July 05, 2009 - 05:22 PM |
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Not ony China too.
There was a guy in N.Z. running a smallish country supermarket, who used to turn off the freezers every night to save power. Turn on again in early morning. (his nationality was not Kiwi)
He wouldn't save much power actually, but probably toilet roll sales would soar.
Eventually he received a slapping, then continued on. |
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johnboy88 |
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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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July 05, 2009 - 05:29 PM |
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^ Absolutely there are stories such as this in every country of the world. The difference is what is the norm?
Ahhhhhh... |
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Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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CityShop
Newbie
Joined: July 15, 2009
Posts: 3
Status: Offline
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July 22, 2009 - 09:54 AM |
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| Post subject: reply from cityshop |
We read the comment of a customer who’s unhappy with the frozen food in City Shop Supermarket. It’s said that partially thawed food or freezers were not at the correct temperature. Immediately we made the following decisions and put them into effect.
Firstly, employees are trained in the area of Frozen Food. It includes not displaying the thawed food in the fridge, controlling the fridge temperature strictly and improving the process of frozen food from freezer warehouse to fridge.
Secondly, the delivery process of frozen food is improved. We control the time of transferring products from freezer warehouse to freezer truck in 2 minutes and that from freezer truck to fridge in 5 minutes.
Thirdly, we’ll supervise the delivery process closely everyday to avoid the same incident happening again.
At last, If any customers notice any problems about our products or employee service, don’t hesitate and just let us know. You can contact the following e mail at any time: customer@cityshop.com.cn |
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tihZ_hO
Post Roaster
Joined: Feb 17, 2004
Posts: 4234
Location: Shanghai / Jakarta
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July 22, 2009 - 10:06 AM |
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Firstly, employees are trained in the area of Frozen Food. It includes not displaying the thawed food in the fridge,
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Are you saying that any frozen food that has thawed will not be displayed until it is refrozen? Thawed frozen food should not be refrozen and offered for sale. FAIL! |
_________________
Battered deep fried butter, donut hamburgers, is it any wonder America has more body mass than China. China is the counterweight for America or else the Earth would be unbalanced and fly into the sun. |
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zoolander
Barker
Joined: July 01, 2008
Posts: 175
Status: Offline
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July 22, 2009 - 11:24 AM |
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this topic is too boring already.. if you really want to make a change then go to the press and complain to them and tell them the mistakes that the super market is doing.
complaining here about cityshop wont make any difference at all...
want to make a change then go to the press or go to ICS.. |
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