Cold Chain Synergy of Chain Restaurant

With the economic development and social progress, the modern catering industry represented by chain operation is gradually moving towards industrialization, chain operation, and modernization. The chain restaurant industry relies more on professional and efficient cold chain supply chain design and services. The cold chain supply chain system includes a distribution center based on the central kitchen, specialized third-party logistics based on its own or outsourced cold chain logistics, and food taste quality research and development represented by new technologies.

cold chain facilities is a difficult problem for all catering enterprises. Meanwhile, catering chain enterprises lack effective coordination of cold chain logistics resources.
Without an effective distribution network, store managers of catering restaurants need to place many orders to various suppliers and take delivery for many times, which will increase the operating cost, and then affect the business development. Therefore, the establishment of distribution centers in catering chains can greatly reduce the complexity of distribution, and then effectively guarantee the cold chain control and food safety. In addition, the cost of delivery and the cost of food waste can be reduced through the integration of cold chain distribution, store distribution routes and receiving time.
Cold chain, as a whole system, is a strict temperature control process. Whether in the low-temperature warehouse storage and central kitchen processing area, or in the process of loading and unloading, as well as during the transport of refrigerated trucks, temperature must be strictly controlled. At present, the weakest link in chain catering supply chain is the storage and transportation of cold chain. The success or failure of chain catering brand depends on the process of cold chain control. Yikang

Company and First Finance Channel present the Seven Stars Award for Food Safety in the Catering
Industry every year. All the winners have perfect and strict cold chain control.
Western chain restaurants have built a green supply chain system from farmland and pasture to customer's dining table by referring to the standard model from the parent company abroad to improve the cold chain logistics system. Most of them already have a complete cold chain logistics system. But what Chinese consumers need is a popular and reassuring Chinese food chain that conforms to consumption habits. How to improve the operation of Chinese catering chains through industry exchanges and appropriately learning from abroad is a top priority.
Chain catering industry centers on network platform and is the control center of a virtual network. In catering chains, information sharing is realized through ERP system of back-end supporting department and POS/MENU LINK system of front-end store, achieving effective collaboration among suppliers, service providers and customers.
This electronic supply chain provides strong support for visibility, intelligence and synchronous decision-making in cold chain operation. Through the real-time monitoring and early warning mechanism of cold chain temperature by RFID, the deterioration loss in the circulation and storage of goods can be reduced, information traceability can be facilitated, and the responsibility of quality accidents can be identified. It also improves the safety of cold chain food, enhances the consumer confidence, and establishes the enterprise brand. WMS management of cold storage, GPS positioning of refrigerated car and management of car loading by using TMS system have all played a positive role.
The implementation of electronic cold chain in catering chain enterprises can enhance the reaction speed of cold chain and create a complete and competitive supply chain consortium.
The cold chain business should be a high value-added service provided by third-party logistics companies for chain catering enterprises. A typical example is Xia Hui's cold chain service for

HACCP Management in Chain Catering Cold Chain Control Process
HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point) is a preventive food safety management system based on GMP (Good Manufacturing Practices) and SSOP (Sanitation Standard Operation Procedures). It mainly supervises, controls and prevents safety risks in processing by predicting potential risks. There is no doubt that HACCP management is the continuation of food processing. HACCP attaches great importance to the analysis and control of all links in catering chain operation, pays attention to food safety in each link, carries out hazard analysis from raw material procurement, transportation storage, production and processing, to packaging, warehousing and cold chain distribution, and formulates key control points, so as to ensure that food safety is organically integrated into cold chain logistics operation.
At the same time, HACCP management should be instilled in the distribution center, the central kitchen and the third-party logistics warehouse. When receiving the goods, the vehicle inspection is required, and the temperature control record must be exported to prevent pollution, odor, water leakage and damage. When harvesting the receipt, it is necessary to check the delivery date, batch number and specifications, especially to see if there are signs of thawing. When stacking the film, the information such as the high-strength wrap film of the mixed code layer needs to be clearly marked. When storing, it needs to be placed in the corresponding freezer or refrigerator according to the required temperature.
When leaving the warehouse, attention must be paid to cleanliness and hygiene to prevent cross-contamination. Pre-cooling temperature should be set according to the cold chain requirements.
The following table records the temperature range of cold chain logistics and the temperature and pressure settings for the ultra high pressure treated food.

Application of Cold Chain and Non-thermal Processing Technology in Chain Catering
The food requiring cold chain logistics in the chain catering industry includes: vegetables, fruits, meat, poultry, eggs, aquatic products, flowers and other primary products; frozen food, poultry, meat, aquatic products, and other packaged cooked food, and ice cream, dairy products, chocolate, fast food raw materials and wine, etc. The quality assurance of frozen food proposed by Assad from United States depends on the "3T": the food's freezing time, temperature, and tolerance, which means, the time and the temperature experienced in the circulation have a decisive influence on the tolerance of the quality.
Additionally, the quality of frozen food also depends on the pre-freeze quality (produce), processing, packaging and other factors, namely the "3P" theory. All of these will affect the quality of the dishes in the chain restaurants.
Color, taste and texture are important quality characteristics of vegetables, fruits and seafood meats, they also are the main factors affecting the sensory quality and customer's acceptance of the food. The inhibition of food spoilage can be achieved by controlling the low temperature of cold chain. Low temperature can inhibit the growth of microorganisms and kill some microbial pathogens. However, biological pathogens die more slowly at low temperature. Low temperature can also inhibit the activity of the enzyme, but general it cannot be completely inhibited by refrigeration and freezing. Therefore, in order to improve the shelf life of food, it is necessary to simultaneously obtain the effect of cold chain processing and storage by ultra-high pressure sterilization, which is a combination of growth stop, growth inhibition and growth promotion.
When the temperature is lowered, the respiration of vegetables and fruits is weakened, the transpiration is reduced, and the shelf life is extended, but the taste and freshness are affected. Since the high-pressure processing method has little effect on the covalent bond of food, its influence on food nutrition and texture is minimized. Therefore, high-pressure processing is a good alternative to traditional food processing and preservation methods.
Unlike traditional high temperature sterilization methods, ultra-high pressure processing (HPP) refers to food processing technology that seals food in containers, uses water or oil as pressure transmitting medium, and presses food at normal temperature or low temperature, to kill microorganisms effectively after a certain period of time and maximize the original quality of the product.
High-pressure processed meat can promote the release of protein, eliminate some allergens, and remove pathogens. These fresh foods are highly susceptible to deterioration and are easy to reduce freshness during long-distance transportation and sales, which directly affects the final market demand.
According to the experimental results, the coordinative treatment of ultra-high pressure and freezing can greatly improve the tenderness of pre-made steak. The combination of these two methods can be more effective in sterilizing steaks. In the cold chain, the total number of colonies under the same pressure will be lower than that under normal temperature and ultra-high pressure. Thus, this processing operation can significantly extend the shelf life of steak, and its taste can be better. When beef tastes bad due to insufficient acid-discharging period, this method can improve the taste and increase customer satisfaction through ultra-high pressure cold chain processing. Therefore, considering the transportation distance of products, how to manage the cold chain transportation and inventory, and how to guide and control requirements through appropriate strategies, in order to achieve effective matching of the fresh product supply chain, and thereby improving profits and reducing waste, is particularly important for upstream and downstream enterprises in the food supply chain and is a common challenge for chain restaurants. At the same time, the ultra-high pressure processed food have strict requirements for the cold chain. Therefore, only through reasonable optimization of cold chain logistics can the cost be reduced, the shelf life and taste of the products be improved, and the consumption of ultra-high pressure foods be popularized. Otherwise, ultra-high pressure foods can only become so-called high-end foods, and cold chain innovation will only become www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/jepf a high-cost technology application. In the process of ultra-high pressure sterilization, different combinations of pressure and temperature can be used to achieve the desired color, taste and texture of the food. However, when endogenous enzymes or microorganisms are not completely inactivated, the quality of processed vegetables and fruits may change during storage due to coexisting chemical reactions (e.g., oxidation and biochemical reactions). Therefore, the design of the cold chain should base on how to prevent the above chemical reactions.
Compared with traditional processed foods, ultra-high pressure foods also have differences in the coordination of supply chain members. Based on the choice behavior of the final customers foods and juices with different freshness, this study adopts a stochastic modeling and optimization method to analyze transport and sale strategies, as well as the coordination of upstream and downstream production and logistics enterprises. The rational design and implementation of the cold chain can improve the freshness of the products, extend the shelf life of the foods that are easily spoiled after the ultra-high pressure treatment, and improve the customer satisfaction as well as the core competitiveness of the enterprise. By applying the supply chain model, the innovation of the cold chain management can be studied from the relationship between the independent variables and the dependent variables of the impact factors. As mentioned above, color, taste and texture are important quality characteristics, as well as the decisive factors influencing customer's acceptance of the food. In ultra-high pressure processing, different combinations of pressure and temperature can be used to achieve the desired color, taste and texture of the food.
In addition, the packaging design and packaging materials should also match the temperature of cold chain storage and transportation, avoiding the safety problems caused by packaging breakage. At the same time, only soft materials can be used for packaging under ultra-high pressure, so the packaging material is not required to have heat resistance, but its airtightness must be good and must be able to transmit pressure, it also needs to prevent the penetration of high-pressure medium and cannot be destroyed under high pressure. Therefore, the food container can be mainly hexagonal, so that when the ultra-high pressure sterilization is performed, the force is balanced without causing expansion or breakage.

The Collaboration of Cold Chain Logistics in Chain Restaurant Industry
In general, the development trend of the chain restaurant catering industry is to establish a cold chain logistics distribution center based on the central kitchen. The cold chain synergy includes coordination among suppliers, coordination between central kitchen and suppliers, as well as cold chain logistics distribution centers and suppliers, coordination among delivery centers, and coordination between restaurant and cold chain logistics providers. The coordination involves all aspects of operation, including capital, production, and comprehensive utilization of equipment, effective use of cold chain facilities, and information sharing. The synergies will ultimately enhance the core competency of supply chain, which allowing all parties to achieve a win-win situation in the end.
The contribution of this research will be the devotion of cold chain synergies in chain restaurant and the author will continue the foods and beverage cold chain research in the application of non-thermal process in the future.