Category Archives: Thermometers

A (thermometer-verified) Canadian Thanksgiving in Australia

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 I’ve got turkeys wandering around the yard but I can’t buy one at the grocer or butcher.

Paul the butcher in Annerley, Brisbane, Australia, took pity on me and gave me – gave me for free – a frozen turkey breast he had in his freezer.

“If it sucks, throw it out.”

I threw it out.

Paul says he does a lot of turkeys for Christmas, but Thanksgiving just isn’t an Australian thing.

And it’s sorta weird, with spring strawberries and asparagus abundant rather than the traditional North American harvest foods.

Was even weirder prepping food all morning while Amy played with Sorenne and listened to the K-State football game on Internet radio.

But, we continued our tradition and had some 15 Aussies over for a Canadian Thanksgiving feast.

And instead of North American football, there was the 2011 Rugby World Cup quarterfinals: yeah Wales (suck it Ireland); France will lose next weekend to Wales; yeah Australia (suck it South Africa), and in a few hours it should be yeah New Zealand (suck it Argentina).

No confusion here: cook ground beef to 160F

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 As a Canadian citizen with permanent U.S. residency living in Australia, I get confused.

Even with a language professor by my side, I can barely understand a damn word anyone says – especially the Canadians.

Fellow Queenslander Pat Dignam also appears confused when he writes in the Irish Times that food irradiation “is routine in some countries, including the U.S., so eating rare hamburgers there is safe.”

No. A small fraction of American ground beef is irradiated, and almost none of that is available at retail or food service.

Mr. Dignam is correct when he says, “During the butchering process, the surface of cuts of meat may become contaminated with bacteria, notably E. coli, from the intestines of the animal (regardless of the standards applied by the farmer and butcher). Cooking an intact piece of meat on the surface is sufficient to kill any such bacteria. However, when a piece of meat is minced, contamination on the surface can be spread to any part of the product. … Irish mince is not irradiated, so the process of cooking through is crucial. E. coli infection can be fatal, so anyone who wishes to eat rare or raw minced beef in Ireland should take note of these facts.”

Well said, except for the U.S. bit. And things get confusing when intact cuts like steaks are needle-tenderized.

The facts are ground beef in the U.S. needs to be cooked to 160F (71C) as verified by a tip-sensitive digital thermometer.

Stick it in.

Simple roast chicken with a digital tip-sensitive thermometer

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Food safety has never been Mark Bitman’s strong point. The author of Don’t blame sprouts, and For the love of a good burger (in which he advocated rare hamburger consumption) usually sides with polemic rather than evidence. But yesterday in the N.Y. Times, Bittman offered his simple recipe for roast chicken and advocated the use of a thermometer.

1. “Put a cast-iron skillet on a low rack in the oven and heat the oven to 500 degrees. Rub the chicken all over with the oil and sprinkle it generously with salt and pepper.

2. “When the oven and skillet are hot, carefully put the chicken in the skillet, breast side up. Roast for 15 minutes, then turn the oven temperature down to 350 degrees. Continue to roast until the bird is golden brown and an instant-read thermometer inserted into the meaty part of the thigh reads 155 to 165 degrees.”

Been doing a variation of this for years (right). In the accompanying video, Bittman makes no mention of the thermometer and instead says there should be the “tiniest trace of pink,” along with lots of cross-contamination, but it’s a baby step.

safefood Queensland: you’re breaking my (temperature-verified) heart

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 In what appears to be an ineffectual use of twitter akin to travel and weather updates from people who occasionally say something useful, safefood Queensland (that’s in Australia) posted 10 tips for chicken preparation ending with this nosestretcher.

“And finally Tip 1: Make sure that you never serve partially cooked chicken to anyone. Chicken is cooked when the juices run clear.”

Color is a lousy indicator of safety for any meat. This has been extensively referenced, and why Canadians and Americans tell people to use a tip-sensitive digital thermometer. The chicken leg with back attached (right, thanks Pete Snyder) has been cooked to a thermometer-verified and safe 165F. There may be a yuck factor, but it’s microbiologically safe.

Surveys continue to mislead

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 Saying that almost 1-in-5 Americans use a digital thermometer to determine whether a burger is safe to eat is as accurate as surveys that find upwards of 90 per cent of hospital employees wash their hands when they’re supposed to.

In a continuing demonstration of the futility of self-reported surveys, 19 per cent of Americans polled on behalf of the American Meat Institute say they use an instant-read thermometer to determine if beef or poultry burgers are safe to eat (160F and 165F respectively).

When some form of direct observation is used to evaluate medical handwashing rates, the numbers hover around 20 per cent – not 90 per cent. Some form of direct observation of thermometer usage would probably find a similar reduction – about 2 per cent of people actually use them.

I’m the first to praise Americans for advocating thermometer use and the first to taunt the Brits for their piping-hot-school-of-safe cooking, but self-reported surveys are a lousy indicator of what is actually going on in kitchens and cook-outs.

A digital thermometer for Father’s Day – a love story

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 As Father’s Day comes to a close in Australia – it’s celebrated the first Sunday in Sept., after the first day of spring, Sept. 1 – I tried out my gift, a digital thermometer Amy found for me at the Big W for $18.

Somewhat pricey, but everything in Australia is, the Ekco digital thermometer performed well on the basa fillets I baked for dinner along with sweet potato and corn on the cob. Future improvement: list on packaging whether the thermometer is tip-sensitive or not. How’s a consumer to know?

Two weeks in Australia, still no meat thermometer

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I used to cook. And then I met Doug. And all the food safety that I quickly learned scared me.

It’s no secret that Doug does all the cooking in our family. So now that Sorenne and I are in Australia patiently awaiting his arrival, I’ve cooked several frightening meals. I have no way of knowing if the chicken, sausage, or beef are going to kill us. I’ve looked for meat thermometers rather seriously at different major stores here and the only one I’ve seen was at Target – a ridiculously large round display on top of a probe. Think American turkey thermometer that comes out only at Thanksgiving and magnify the size by about 5. I tried again at Coles tonight… nada.

For dinner tonight I opted for pre-made raw meatballs to accompany the linguine because having a small child around is not conducive to getting up to your elbows in meat (especially when she’s screaming, “Mooooooom! Milk!”). I did my best to make a well-done meatball (I mean, who doesn’t love crispy meatballs), but how are mere mortals supposed to see if something’s cooked just by using our naked eyeballs?

Come on, Australia. Food safety is not just an American thing. I’m tired of worrying whether I’ll kill our 2 ½ year old over dinner. And I miss my favorite food safety expert’s voice in my ear reminding me to use a meat thermometer.

Perfect burger BS

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There is so much crap on the Internet.

Ozersky.tv has some dude claiming to make the perfect burger; it’s a perfect example of microbial cross-contamination as he handles the meat and then everything else.

Ozersky likes his burgers medium-rare and pink in the middle; crustry throughout, with no temperature verification and a side of dangerous microorganisms.

He also uses slices of Velveeta because it melts at room temperature.
 


How to Grill the Perfect Burger — powered by ehow

Cook steaks to 120 F, 160 or 170 , not to bloody, red or pink

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Chef Ramsey’s kitchen rage is topped only by Donald Trump’s hair, rants, and famous line “you are fired.”

The final challenge on Ramsey’s latest show was to determine which of two chefs stays one more week by cooking three steaks each, one rare, one medium, and one well done. As one of the chefs uses a tip sensitive digital thermometer to check temperatures, Chef Graham Elliot comments something along these lines – every time he uses the thermometer, he lets those juices flow out.

According to the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, medium steaks should be cooked to an internal temperature of 160º F, well done 170º F and rare is not listed, but it’s usually around 120º-125º F (no one really knows). Four out of the six steaks looked pretty much the same (right, exactly as shown), so we’ll never know what the temperatures were.

When I ask for my steak to be rare, get it to at least 120º F and don’t even think about using the cheek or hand tests.

Use a thermometer — absolutely perfect steaks

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According to the cookbook, Grillin’ with Gas by Hank Hill Fred Thompson, and reproduced on Culinate:

“Judging the doneness of steak is not as much science as it is technique and feel.

“Poke your index finger into your cheek at mouth level. Then press your finger into the steak. If they feel very similar, that’s an indication of a rare steak.

“Touching the tip of your nose gives you the feel of a medium steak, and touching your forehead is a medium-well to well-done steak.”

Use a tip-sensitive thermometer and stick it in.