Thawing pork butt


 
No matter how many bugs grow on your thawing food, the bugs will die in the cooking process. However, the excrement left behind by the bugs is not affected by cooking and it can make you very sick.

I've never heard this. Can you post the science on this?

I've thought that the risk with thawed meat was when cooking only to a low temp -- like beef medium rare. But not with BBQ which spends hours and hours and hours in the 160-205F zone.
 
Jim C in Denver said:
No matter how many bugs grow on your thawing food, the bugs will die in the cooking process. However, the excrement left behind by the bugs is not affected by cooking and it can make you very sick.

I've never heard this. Can you post the science on this?

I've thought that the risk with thawed meat was when cooking only to a low temp -- like beef medium rare. But not with BBQ which spends hours and hours and hours in the 160-205F zone.
Click to expand...
It came straight from the mouth of Harry Soo at one of his classes. Though with a quick search on duck duck go, I did find this:

https://www.foodsafety.ca/blog/what-are-bacterial-toxins

It's from the government of our neighbor to the north. Here's a little excerpt:

Many bacterial toxins, including those produced by Staphylococcus aureus, are heat-stable or heat resistant — which means they are not destroyed by the cooking process.

If food contaminated with toxin-producing bacteria is cooked, the bacteria is killed but the food remains contaminated with toxins that can cause food poisoning or more serious conditions, such as pneumonia, urinary tract infection or kidney failure.

This means the only way to protect against food poisoning from bacterial toxins is to control the conditions in which high-risk foods like meat, poultry, seafood and dairy are handled.
 
Agree the cold water bath is probably the best (and safest) method. But I've done more than a few frozen butts in the past with great results. Only difference is you need a couple extra hours and use some mustard to get the rub to stick (if you don't already).
 
Thursday around noon, we put the butts in a cold water bath for about an hour and a half, then back in the fridge. Yesterday evening they were totally thawed and I prepped them. This morning I injected and put the rub on and they went on the smoker at 5:15.

Thanks for all the replies.
 
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