Pub fridge and cellar temperature log: the 8°C rule, what to write down, and what a dead fridge does to your stock

Chilled food has to be kept at 8°C or below. That's the law in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and the recommendation in Scotland. The Food Standards Agency says set the fridge to 5°C so it stays under 8°C when the door's been open all night, and check fridges at least once a day as part of your opening checks. In a pub that covers the kitchen fridges and any fridge with milk or ready-to-eat food in it. The bottle fridges and the cellar aren't food safety at all. They're money, and a dated log is the only proof you've got when one of them fails.

Most of the temperature log templates out there are council PDFs written for cafés and care homes, and half the rest are American vaccine charts. None of them know a pub has five or six different cold things in it, each with a different reason to be checked. So here's which is which, what the law actually asks you to write down, and what a fridge that dies on a Saturday does to your stock figures.

Which cold things in a pub need checking, and why

Unit	What's in it	Target	Law or money?
Kitchen fridges and walk-in	Use-by food, cooked dishes, prepared salads and desserts	Set at 5°C, never above 8°C	Law in England, Wales and NI
Bar fridge with milk and cream	Milk for coffee, cream for Irish coffees	Set at 5°C, never above 8°C	Law in England, Wales and NI
Sandwich or dessert display	Ready-to-eat food on show	8°C or below	Law in England, Wales and NI
Freezer	Frozen food	Frozen hard, working properly	Part of your opening checks
Bottle fridges	Bottled beer, wine, mixers, soft drinks	Whatever sells best cold	Money
Cellar and cooler	Kegs and casks	11 to 13°C	Money

The 8°C rule is about food that needs chilling to stop bacteria growing: anything with a use-by date, and ready-to-eat food like cooked dishes and prepared salads. A fridge full of bottled lager isn't covered, and nobody from the council is going to ask you for its readings. Write it down anyway. The reason is further down.

If you're in Scotland, the 8°C figure is recommended rather than written into law, but your environmental health officer will expect the same discipline, so I'd run it the same way.

What the law actually asks you to write down

There's no law that says "keep a temperature log with these columns". What the law does say, in the FSA's own words, is that you must write down what you do to keep food safe, and have food safety procedures based on HACCP in place. Not having them is an offence.

For most pubs that serve food, the FSA's Safer Food, Better Business pack is how you meet it. Its minimum is a diary filled in every day, with opening and closing checks ticked off and anything out of the ordinary written down, plus a review every four weeks. Fridges, chilled display and freezers working properly is the first item on the opening checks. And the fridge section says check the temperature at least once a day, starting with your opening checks, using the display and then a clean probe between packs to make sure the display isn't lying.

One more legal record people forget sits right next to this one. You have to keep a record of the food you've bought, who from, how much, when, and the allergen information. Keeping every invoice does the job. That's the same pile of paper that should be feeding your stock figures, so if your delivery notes are going in a drawer for the food safety officer, they might as well go into your stock system on the way.

A log that would stand up

Whatever you write it in, every reading wants the date, the time, which unit, the reading, who took it, and what you did if it was out. That last column is the easiest one to leave empty and the most useful one when something's gone wrong.

Once a day at opening is the minimum. On a hot week I'd add the cellar at close as well, because that's when a struggling cooler shows itself.

Check the probe too. The FSA's simple test is iced water and boiling water: the probe should read between -1°C and 1°C in iced water and between 99°C and 101°C in boiling water. Outside that, replace it or get it calibrated. If the maker's instructions don't say how often, once a month is the FSA's example. Write that down as well, because a log taken with a broken probe proves nothing.

When a reading is out

The FSA's line on a fridge or display that breaks down is plain. Move the food to other equipment or a cold area. If you can't, or you don't know how long the fridge has been off, ring the environmental health team at your council for advice. Food that needs refrigeration and hasn't been kept chilled for more than four hours goes in the bin.

The four hours comes from the FSA's display exception: chilled food can be out of the fridge for up to four hours, once. That's for a buffet, not a broken fridge you found at 10am with no idea when it went. If the last reading in the book is yesterday's opening check, you don't know how long it's been, and that's the whole argument for the log.

The money side: why I log the bottle fridges and the cellar too

A fridge that dies overnight turns stock into waste. If it's the kitchen walk-in on a Friday, that can be a few hundred quid of food in the bin before you open. If you've got cover for deterioration of stock, the insurer is going to want to know what was lost and when the fridge failed. A temperature log with yesterday's normal reading, this morning's failed one and a wastage list with costs is that evidence. A shrug isn't. I've set out what an insurer asks for in the stock loss insurance guide, and whether you're covered depends on your own schedule, so check it before you need it.

Then log the loss as waste, at cost, on the day. Otherwise it turns up a month later as a hole in your stocktake that nobody can explain. The wastage log guide covers how.

The cellar is where it gets expensive quietly. Cask Marque surveyed cask drinkers and found 97% were happy with beer at the industry standard of 11 to 13°C. Above 14°C, satisfaction fell to 52%. And in their 2019 figures, one in three pints of cask served the summer before had gone over the bar at more than 14°C. Warm beer doesn't just sell slower. Warm keg fobs at the tap, and fob is beer you've paid for, with about 50p of duty in every pint, going down the drip tray. A cellar that creeps up a few degrees in July shows up as a worse draught yield on the next stocktake with no obvious cause. A reading at close tells you it was the cooler, not the staff.

The cellar management basics guide has the full routine. If you're closing up for a refurb, the cooler and fridges are on the closure checklist too.

Paper or phone

A paper diary is fine if it gets filled in. The trouble is it gets filled in on Sunday for the whole week, in the same pen, and anyone who's ever looked at one knows it. It also lives in the kitchen, so the bar staff who open up don't touch it.

That's why StockTap has a Checks screen. Each fridge and the cellar gets its own safe range. Temperatures and opening and closing checklists go on the staff phones, where people clock in anyway. Every reading shows who took it and when, and so does every tick on the checklist. If someone fills in a missed day later, it's marked as filled in later rather than pretending otherwise, and you can look back or download the history. Staff phones show the checks and their own clock-in, never wages or takings.

Be clear about what it isn't. It doesn't replace the rest of Safer Food, Better Business: the allergen information and the written safe methods are still yours to keep. It just makes the daily bit harder to skip and harder to fake, which is the bit that fails at inspection.

What I'd do this week

Walk round with a notebook and list every cold thing in the building, including the little fridge under the coffee machine. Put the probe in iced water and see what it says. Then take one reading from each unit at opening tomorrow, write it down with the time and your initials, and keep going. A week of that and you'll know which fridge runs warm before it costs you anything.

Common questions

What temperature should a pub fridge be?

Set it at 5°C or below, so food stays under the legal maximum of 8°C even with the door going all night. That legal limit applies in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and is recommended in Scotland.

How often do I need to record fridge temperatures?

The FSA's Safer Food, Better Business pack says check fridges and chilled display at least once a day as part of your opening checks, with the diary filled in every day. Busier kitchens or ones with problem fridges may need more.

Does a bottle fridge behind the bar need a temperature log?

Not for food safety if it only holds drinks. It's still worth a daily reading, because a failed fridge is a stock loss, and a dated log is your evidence for an insurer and your explanation at the next stocktake.

What temperature should a pub cellar be?

11 to 13°C is the industry standard for cask. Cask Marque found drinker satisfaction fell to 52% once cask was served above 14°C. A warm cellar also makes keg fob, which shows up as lost yield.

How do I check my probe thermometer is accurate?

Put it in iced water and then boiling water. It should read between -1°C and 1°C, and between 99°C and 101°C. If it doesn't, replace it or have it calibrated. Once a month is a sensible check if the maker doesn't say.