Pulled Pork Dilemma


 
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Paul McBride

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OK, I'm having a bit of an unfortunate quandry, and would really appreciate some expert advice.

I made two Butts this weekend. They came out great; my wife said they were the best I've done so far. Tons of leftover meat. Life is good.

So that night, in the middle of the night, my oldest son gets violently ill. And then ill some more. Poor kid spends half the night throwing up. Of course, my immediate fear is the pork.

Now, no one else in the family got sick, but I'm hard pressed to figure out what else might have made my son ill. My inclination is to be on the safe side and throw the meat out; I mean, yeah, that would suck, but it's only $20 worth of meat, right? Nothing compared to the health and welfare of my family.

What do you all think? I was, as always, very careful in preparing the pork. It was refigerated at all times, right until it went in the smoker. I maintained a lid temp of about 240, and smoked the pork up to 195. Am i right in think that I should throw it out, just to be safe? Or am I being paranoid and overly cautious.

I appreciate your feedback...
 
As a father of 2 youngsters with another on the way, I'd probably pitch it unless a visit to the doc rules out the pork as a potential cause.

Odds are the pork is fine, but I wouldn't want to risk a repeat performance.

Hope your son is feeling better.

R
 
Hope the little guy's alright Paul. I'd toss the meat in the trash. Even if it isn't a problem with the meat, it just isn't worth taking the risk.
 
Paul

For your peace of mind, throw it out. On the other hand I seriously doubt if anything was wrong with the meat. Lots of bugs going around and kids catch them all. Your MD would probably tell you to bring it to him "to be sure its ok".
/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif

Paul
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Paul McBride:
[qb]. . . it's only $20 worth of meat, right? Nothing compared to the health and welfare of my family.
[/qb] <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>You got that right, Paul!

I'd wait to pitch the meat, though, as long as you are completely confident in your food handling practices. If you have any doubt then chalk it up to experience. Gives you another chance to smoke!

Hope your son feels better soon.
 
Paul....

Sorry to hear about your son!

If it makes you feel any better, your meat may not have been the origin of his illness. There is an incubation period for food borne illnesses and many of the bugs take a day or 2 to present themselves.

The following link is a good, quick explanation of what bugs are responsible and how long the incubation period is.

Food Borne Illness
 
Well, thanks for the concern, everyone. My son is fine; even went to school yesterday.

I'm about 85% sure that the pork didn't cause the illness. Five of us ate the pork, and only my oldest son got ill. My middle son, my wife, and I each ate mor ethan my oldest son. We all felt fine.

That said, that nagging 15% won't go away. I'm going to throw the rest of the pork away tonight. Better safe than sorry. I'm really just sick about the whole thing, but I'd be really depressed of we went ahead and ate more of it and more people got sick.

I appreciate everyone's feedback. Happy smoking!
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Paul McBride:
[qb] Well, thanks for the concern, everyone. My son is fine; even went to school yesterday.

I'm about 85% sure that the pork didn't cause the illness. Five of us ate the pork, and only my oldest son got ill. My middle son, my wife, and I each ate mor ethan my oldest son. We all felt fine.

That said, that nagging 15% won't go away. I'm going to throw the rest of the pork away tonight. Better safe than sorry. I'm really just sick about the whole thing, but I'd be really depressed of we went ahead and ate more of it and more people got sick.

I appreciate everyone's feedback. Happy smoking! [/qb] <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Glad your boy's OK. No telling if it was your pork or not. Throwing it out just in case was the right call, though. So far, nobody has gotten sick off my food. Knock on wood.
 
Well, as a coda to this sordid little tale:

Each of my two other boys came down with the stomach bug this morning. Since it's been 4 days since we ate the pork, I'm now almost completely certain that it is actually a stomach bug, not the pork. So the two pans of pulled pork fell victim to coincidence...
 
That's too bad the pork got tossed and the kids got sick too. But if you had kept the pork, fed it to the kids and they got sick anyway(because of the bug) you would have really felt terrible. $20 worth of pork isn't worth the heart-ache. You have the peace of mind knowing it wasn't the pork. Hope the kids feel better soon.

Bob
 
Glad your son is ok. I hope it isn't too long before he can bring himself to eat pulled pork again! I got sick after eating lasagna once and couldn't bring myself to eat it for about 15 years. I know it's irrational, but who said I was rational!
 
blyons I know what you mean. I got sick off of Honey Nut Cheerios about 15 years ago and haven't eaten it since.

Paul I hope everyone does ok. We all went through the stomach but here. My son (2) woke up one night about 2:00am sick then again at 4:00am. After that he was fine. About 3 days later I got it and felt terrible for about 12-14 hours. Then the misses got it a day after that. Seems its been going around our town for about 2 months.
 
Well, by the time my 11 month old daughter came down with the bug, we had completely ruled out the pork. Still, I agree with Bob that, had we continued eating the pork and everyone caugth the bug, we would have been certain that it was the pork and I would have felt extremely guilty. Now, we know for sure it wasn't.

Plus, I'm now out of kids that have to experience this annoying stomach bug!

Thanks for the feedback, all. I'll probably be taking a week or so off from smoking, just to let everyone recover (including myself, from the trauma of throwing so much great food away). But I'll be back...
 
A few weeks ago I attended Barf-fest '04 when my wife and kids got food poisoning from a bad orange. I was up most of that night doing clean up duty. They are all fine now of course.

None the less I still would have tossed the pork (and probably half the fridge now) if I was in your shoes.

Better to toss my pork than toss my cookies! /infopop/emoticons/icon_eek.gif
 
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