To determine whether your food is RTE, you need to assess whether you have adequately controlled for all of the applicable potential hazards for the food. Ask yourself questions such as:
Have you conducted a hazard analysis to assess the potential for known or reasonably foreseeable hazards for your product?
Do you have preventive controls in place for each of the hazards identified through your hazard analysis?
Have you validated that your process controls achieve adequate lethality for biological hazards?
Does your process potentially introduce additional hazards that require control (e.g., through post-processing contamination due to environmental exposure)?
Is any further processing necessary to ensure the food is safe for consumption?
