In the vacuum packaging blog, I explored how vacuum packaging affects bacterial growth. One point worth revisiting is that all raw meat naturally contains some level of bacteria—there’s no such thing as completely sterile fresh meat. The goal in hygienic meat production isn’t to eliminate bacteria entirely (that’s impossible), but to keep levels as low as possible through careful handling and strict quality controls.

At Lenah, maintaining those low levels is a core focus. Like all professional meat processing facilities, we use a combination of quality assurance (QA) systems and practical hygiene measures—think knife sterilisers, hands-free wash stations, and disciplined day-to-day practices. But beyond that, we also run detailed monitoring programs to verify just how clean our product really is.

One example is our weekly AQL (Acceptable Quality Limits) assessments. These checks are carried out on carcasses immediately after the skinning process, helping us monitor and control any physical contamination to ensure it meets strict standards.

We also conduct regular microbiological testing. This involves taking swabs from both meat-contact surfaces (like cutting boards) and from the carcasses themselves. For carcasses, we sample a small 25 cm² area—typically from the rump and shoulder—and incubate those samples on petrifilm plates. This allows any bacteria present to grow into visible colonies, which are then measured as Colony Forming Units (CFU per cm²).

After running these tests over many years, we’ve consistently recorded extremely low bacterial counts. In fact, the results were so low at times that we decided to bring in an independent microbiologist to verify them.

The outcome? His findings matched ours.

To put this into perspective, the Australian Meat Standards guidelines classify anything below 1,000 CFU/cm² as “excellent.” Our independently tested wallaby carcasses came back with results between 40 and 85 CFU/cm²—remarkably low by any standard.

While “sterile” isn’t a word that applies to raw meat, these figures come impressively close. It’s a testament to the care and precision of our processes—and, importantly, to the team behind them. We made sure to celebrate the achievement with a well-deserved “Skinning Excellence Award” for our staff.