The general rule for defrosting meat in the microwave is that it is o.k. if you are going to immediately cook the meat afterwards. In other words, do not thaw and then store meat that has been thawed in the micro.

Good rules to remember--

Keep hot foods hot, keep cold foods cold.

The temperature danger zone (think Kenny Loggins, Top Gun) is between 40F and 140F. Therefore, the safety zone would be below 40F and above 140F.

4 hours or more above 40 and below 140 and you gonna take a riiide in to the dangah zone.

This knowledge comes in handy when you make a big batch of something that you plan on keeping for a while in the fridge. You want to chill it down (40 or below) as fast as possible (under 4 hours) before you refrigerate.

While I think governmental regulation regarding the food industry can sometimes go overboard, I would like to see mandatory labeling for left over food that customers have packed up to take home. I don't feel confident that many people know proper food handling procedures (temperatures) and by the time they reheat their leftovers it may have become contaminated.

Art, can you imagine all those take-home boxes with "reheat to 165" stamped all over them, along with the danger zone rules? I wish. But I wonder how many people would actually follow those rules. Heck, even restaurants don't always follow those rules, which makes me cringe. Food safety issues could fill an entire blog.

But I'm glad that the kitchn is trying to shed some light on safety rules and that it's using the NRA (haha) textbook as its resource!

@OneWallKitchen,

I have seen stickers with the basic rules on them. That way you can stick them to anything.

So far, I've seen them only once and they were from a big restaurant chain. Seems like they are using them to avoid liability.

@art, I've seen them on grab-and-take prepared foods and thought it was awesome! I honestly would love to see these labels on take-home boxes. Maybe those labels will become mandatory. Should similar labels should go on frozen entrees, since they're fully cooked or parcooked foods and are subject to the same bacteria dangers?

Frozen entrees have handling instructions on them already.

The problem I see with leftovers in restaurants is that people are really on their own. In the back of their mind they think everything is cool because it was prepared at a restaurant.

But people often don't pay attention to how long that food has sat at the table bagged up, how long it has been in their trunk, how long it has been on their counter, all before it has made it to the fridge. Also, how hot it should be after re-heating, etc.

i'm thawing some chicken thighs right now. they're in ziploc bags, in a big bowl of cold water, sitting on the counter.

as for foods left out, i'm not so stringent, but i do cover everything, and if it has dairy (mayo, cream cheese) i am more timely about refrigerating it. we gotta build up a strong stomach, right? bacteria is good, right? ;)

@art, instructions include even temp requirements? I haven't had a frozen entree in awhile--they used to just say the basic "uncover, heat, stir, rotate, heat, cool, eat." I'm glad if they've stepped it up!

@kdkaboom, the Jack in the Box franchise in Oklahoma would agree with you! ;D Enjoy your chicken dinner!

Not to make mountains out of mole hills - But Jack in the Box was founded and headquartered in Calif. Most of their stores are in CA, TX and AZ. There's only three in Okla.

The awful e.coli outbreak happened at a Jack in the Box in Seattle.

Sorry! Just gotta represent for my state! We are guilty of a lot of things but Jack in the Crack ain't one of them!

Oh no, Eme, I know--I meant that the JitB restaurants in Oklahoma, and Colorado, too, all closed down after that outbreak. I was surprised that there were any still open at all in Oklahoma. I'm surprised there are in Taco Bell's open there, either; I know someone who contracted hepatitis after eating contaminated food from an Oklahoma branch, and that wasn't even the largest hep outbreak that Taco Bell has ever known.

Like I said in the unrefrigerated post--I was scared to any food I didn't cook myself for weeks after I took the ServSafe class!

OneWall: well i haven't died yet...YET. however, i am VERY anal about the chicken thing. i have my own chicken cutting board (not wood) and i wash my hands even if i looked at the chicken too long...but the thawing process doesn't bother me as much. i didn't have time to thaw in the fridge like normal. but like i said...i ain't dead yet! :)

and i hadn't heard about the jack in the box thing. we're too busy with youtube videos of rats the size of dogs taking over a taco bell in the west village. ;)

In the book Fast Food Nation, the author talks about the Jack In the Box fiasco. The interesting thing about that is that Jack In the Box did a 360 and became a model for food safety in the industry.

Yeah, thanks to David Theno and the HACCP he created!

kd--just don't let that "yet" turn into "until"!

To be fair, my parents always thawed frozen meat on the counter, and I ate that meat all through my childhood. I never caught any sort of foodborne illness from it, and never experienced one until I ate a chain-burger at a mall when I was 16! ;)

@One Wall Kitchen,

Here's a quote from David Theno,

"Why is it a thing of the past? What's changed that makes it impossible or unsafe to have a rare hamburger?

Today we know that there are pathogens in these products that can cause illness, injury, and even, conceivably, death. ... There's a number of bacteria that can be present, and no testing program in the world today can guarantee that there's none in there. That's just not possible.

What can a testing program do? A testing program can make sure that if it's there, it's at a very low, manageable level. But what can a consumer do to make sure that they're not exposed to that? By thoroughly cooking [meat], all those bacteria are killed, and that hazard or that risk is controlled. And that's why it has to be done.

Jack in the Box today has the highest quality ground beef that I believe is available in North America and, conceivably, in the world today, from a microbial standpoint. But our products, I will not guarantee, are free of pathogens in the raw state. So if I gave you a box of Jack in the Box hamburgers, raw hamburgers, and you said, "I want to have these medium rare because of your testing program," I'm going to tell you, "No, you won't. You're going to fully cook those."

Scary, huh? Just assume that the "best" beef in America is contaminated with pathogens.

Where does that leave beef tartare and carpaccio?

@art,

If only there was a sure way to know! We'd have to carry around our own personal testing labs. Heck, I had one friend send me a video clip of a bacterial study done on restaurant lemon slices served in drinks--just about all of them carried bacteria and foreign substances whose origins ranged from sitting out too long to fecal matter. All I could guess is that it's usually the waitstaff or bartender who place the lemon wedges, and they're usually not subjected to the "wear gloves when preparing ready-to-eat, uncooked food" rule that people who stay in the kitchen are supposed to follow. Granted, most people don't get sick from these lemon slices, though those same people slurp them up every day.

Once in awhile, though, you're driving along to work and hear a radio announcement asking anyone who ate a such-and-such a restaurant on this date between these hours return to the restaurant to receive a vaccination shot (true story, and it was a famous, double-dollar sign chain in an affluent shopping area--and in my humble opinion, better restaurants have been closed down for lesser violations). I guess all you can do is hope that whoever's feeding you is following the rules and that you remember to, as well. Hope for the best and try not to worry about every grubby hand that might have touched your supermarket produce before you, or whether or not that package of beef you just picked up wasn't sitting in someone's cart or in the go-backs at the front of the store for a few hours before landing back in the cooler because someone changed their mind. Eep!

I guess I'll just have to take my chances with the taco stand chile relleno burritos I indulge in once in awhile. And I've never had the best beef in America, but I'd put aside my fears to try it in tartare, which I've also never had. When I was a kid, though, my best friend would pull raw hambuger meat out of the freezer, warm it up in her hands, ball it up, and eat it. Possible death-causing bacteria aside, I still thought that was pretty gross. ;)

The irony in that quote is that Theno says the best beef in America is the beef that they use. IBP beef. IBP is the biggest packer/processor in the world. So, if we can't eat the best beef in the world rare, what does that mean?

Using the USDA and Theo's theory, that must mean that the worst beef in America can only be eaten rare? Or no beef can be eaten rare?

My personal interpretation is, the USDA views Farmer John's pasture raised and self-slaughtered beef as the worst beef. Why? because in IBP's world, all beef is contaminated and no other beef that hasn't entered their world qualifies.

Here's my conspiracy theory: All food handling operations, including independent restaurants will operate under the same rules (HAACP) as the supply chains and fast-food restaurants do if the USDA has it's way. That means, further industrialization of the food supply chain. In short, the day will come when I can no longer receive a whole wild salmon and filet it myself. Or, on the subject of beef, will not be able to receive a beef tenderloin or shoulder and trim and portion it myself. The government will reduce all the "hazardous" variables involved with delivering a portion of protein to the food service establishment reducing any responsibility on the part of the supplier or the inspector and making food safety inspection a much more clear-cut process.

Sorry--I know this doesn't have to do with thawing foods anymore. Me and my tangents...

I don't think leaving water running over frozen meat for 20 minutes is exactly environmentally conscious...

art wrote: "In the book Fast Food Nation, the author talks about the Jack In the Box fiasco. The interesting thing about that is that Jack In the Box did a 360 and became a model for food safety in the industry."

Wouldn't that be a 180? =P
Otherwise they'd be right back at the same place.