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Pop quiz! Do you ever buy frozen vacuum-sealed fish? The kind where each piece is sealed in its own plastic pouch? It is convenient and delicious. To me it can

Pop quiz! Do you ever buy frozen vacuum-sealed fish? The kind where each piece is sealed in its own plastic pouch? It is convenient and delicious. To me it can taste fresher than some "fresh" fish. One reason is that the sealed pouch keeps oxygen out. Have you wondered why it says "remove all packaging before defrosting"? And ignored that advice like I did for many years? After all, the fish seems to defrost just fine in its original vacuum-sealed packaging, whether you defrost it in the refrigerator or in a cold water bath. And it is so convenient to leave it in the pouch while defrosting. Well, there is a reason to take those instructions seriously. The vacuum-sealed package is an anerobic environment, just right for botulinum and listeria. So unwrap the fish, let it have that little kiss of oxygen, and then rewrap it for defrosting. https://www.google.com/search?q=remove+frozen+fish+from+packaging https://www.google.com/search?q=remove+frozen+fish+from+pack...

Chris2048 5y ago
> just right for botulinum and listeria But if it was frozen, wouldn't that kill off any bacteria? Then, as a sealed environment, there wouldn't be anything to grow, even if the environment is just right. edit: ignore this comment, I just read how the spores are resistant to boiling/freezing...
- phonypc 5y ago
  Freezing doesn't kill bacteria. Reliably, anyway.
antognini 5y ago
I have wondered about this, but even if botulinum or listeria are present, won't they grow very slowly in the refrigerator? I would think that defrosting for 12 hours or so at refrigerator temperatures would still be fairly safe. Or is the quantity that can be dangerous so minute that it doesn't matter?
- Uehreka 5y ago
  Perhaps its one of those things where “95% of the time you’ll be fine, but be careful if you do it 20 times, because botulism only needs to happen once.”
  - jandrese 5y ago
    The fact that most people don't know to remove the plastic and yet there are virtually no reported cases of people being poisoned by wrapped fish suggests that the danger is remote. It probably helps that if you fish get to the point where the bactera become active again it tends to smell bad and discolour.
    - foobarian 5y ago
      I think if the fish was consumed raw there would be a lot more cases. But the toxin is destroyed by cooking even if the spores do grow.
  - mdp2021 5y ago
    > be careful if you do it 20 times Probably just a locution, but be careful with that idea about numbers: The probability of remaining in a safe zone of 95% for 20 consecutive times is ~36%. It ( (1-(1/n))^n ) approximates to 1/e. The number of tries to reduce that 95% to a 50% coin toss is 13. It is not fully intuitive. One will put his threshold wherever one may think appropriate, but. A chance of tenth, a hundredth, a thousandth etc. for ten, a hundred, thousand etc. times approximates to 63.2%. ...Maybe a locution like 'Maybe 9 out of 10 times you'll be fine, but be careful about doing it 7 times' could work well (as 6.931 approximates the risk to a coin toss).
    - cseleborg 5y ago
      So that explains the seven lives of cats, who 9 times out of 10 land on their feet. (Also, 85% of statistics are made up on the spot.)
    - dredmorbius 5y ago
gibolt 5y ago
This is similar for red meat. Vacuum sealed at the source will keep it fresh longer. Here is a great video on what color meat should be to be considered 'fresh' and how to handle it from there: https://youtu.be/82KT_nb26-4 https://youtu.be/82KT_nb26-4 The rest of the channel is great if you are at all into cooking.
Helmut10001 5y ago
If you put your sealed fish in cold tap water, it will thaw in less than 15 Minutes. 15 Minutes is not enough for the bacteria to produce these toxins.
- glenstein 5y ago
  Right, that was going to be my question. Wouldn't botulism etc need a certain amount of time to grow? Is any normal use case of defrosting in a microwave long enough for that to happen? Is there a safe zone of X minutes, and then an unsafe zone of Y minutes where it gets dangerous?
  - Helmut10001 5y ago
    Fast defrosting in Microwave or sealed, in cold water, is at least better than some of the other suggestions, like poking the seal and slow defrosting over 24 hours in the fridge. In the fridge and without a seal, the effects of exposing fish to other bacteria are really difficult to control.
  - weaksauce 5y ago
    it takes days for the botulism to grow under a vacuum in your fridge depending on temp.(a proper fridge should be 35-40F but many are much higher than that. 50F takes 2 days or so to form) https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in-vacuum-packed-bag https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in...
    - Helmut10001 5y ago
      I know - I was referring to other bacteria in your fridge (such as Listeria etc.)(not in your fridge particularly).
turbinerneiter 5y ago
I defrost my fish in the package by putting it in hot tap water. You, sire, drastically reduced my chance of dying. Thank you very much.
- seszett 5y ago
  Put it in cold tap water in the fridge and it will also defrost much faster than in the air, while staying at a safe temperature the whole time and it also won't be partly cooked already.
- bambax 5y ago
  Do not do that. Defrosting should be done slowly in the fridge. Or you can cook frozen food directly. But do not defrost at or about room temperature, this will breed bacteria like crazy.
  - baobabKoodaa 5y ago
    Wouldn't the food need to warm up to room temperature before bacteria would breed like crazy? If you defrost it from frozen to cold-but-defrosted, shouldn't you be ok, even if the surrounding air is room temperature?
    - dustintrex 5y ago
      The issue is the timing. If you defrost in the fridge, it will eventually reach ambient temperature, but that's still safe. If you defrost on the counter, it will briefly be cold-but-defrosted, but rapidly progress to room-temperature-petri-dish.
    - bambax 5y ago
      > If you defrost it from frozen to cold-but-defrosted, shouldn't you be ok, even if the surrounding air is room temperature Yes, that's my point. If you defrost in the fridge it's ok. If you defrost at room temperature then it's dangerous. It's not extremely dangerous. Many people do it every day and don't die. But it's better not to.
dustintrex 5y ago
Is this really a risk in practice though? I can't find any cases of this actually happening on the CDC's botulism site: https://www.cdc.gov/botulism/surveillance.html https://www.cdc.gov/botulism/surveillance.html
- 2-718-281-828 5y ago
  might become a risk if it lies around defrosted for many hours.
- ckastner 5y ago
  I am somewhat skeptical of this as well. It's not uncommon to hear of someone having eaten something "bad", but that can be the result of many pathogens and with regards to botulinum, the article gives a data point: > In the UK, between 1990 and 2005, there were 5 reported cases affecting 6 people and causing 2 deaths, meaning that you were 15 times more likely to be hit by lightning.
  - koheripbal 5y ago
    That data is clearly only reporting very serious cases though, since one third of them died. Food poisoning is much more common than lightning.
    - ckastner 5y ago
      > Food poisoning is much more common than lightning. I said as much. The question is whether botulism is more common than lightning. Food poisoning is not uncommon, but can be caused by many pathogens, for example E. coli. Given the fact that we have a common illness but very few confirmations of C. botulinum as the cause, the question stands whether this is really a risk in practice.
- weaksauce 5y ago
  it's a risk for certain fish and if you defrost the fish in the fridge for days... but as it stands botulism is not a very common thing to worry about in modern society. there are about 200 poisonings per year in the us. a lot are junkies using shared and dirty needles... babies eating honey is another large one. maybe about 20-50 per year in the us is an adult getting food borne botulism. in any event yes it is risky to defrost the fish in a vacuum sealed bag but only if you thaw it for a few days or more like that. 50F fridge is about 2 days and 45F fridge is a few more days before there is growth: https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in-vacuum-packed-bag https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in... Fwiw i just thaw it the day i use it in cold water for < 1hr and it's almost certainly fine to use that day.
AussieWog93 5y ago
Any people from developing countries reading this thread? What are your thoughts when you hear Westerners talking about the danger of leaving a meat out of the fridge for a couple of hours and stuff like that?
- kaetemi 5y ago
  My wife leaves meat out of the fridge for the practically the whole day...
- swiftcoder 5y ago
  As long as it’s not vacuum sealed, you can leave it on the counter all day. Even in the west we defrost meat this way :)
  - IntrepidWorm 5y ago
    Ahhh... Don't tell the health department. :)
  - astura 5y ago
    No "we" don't. That is expressly against USDA guidelines that say meat left in the danger zone[1] for more than 2 hours should not be consumed. I don't eat meat, but my husband does, and he defrosts his meat in the fridge. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_zone_(food_safety) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_zone_(food_safety)
- martopix 5y ago
  We are talking about leaving meat out of the fridge in a sealed anaerobic environment, which is quite different.
- soneca 5y ago
  No thoughts about the fish, but I was recently very surprised to learn that some people exclude my country, Brazil, from “western” culture. Like you did opposing “developing” and “westerners”. Aside from geographical position, I certainly feel closer in culture to North America and Europe than to Middle-East or East-Asia cultures. Every time I hear a statement with ”in the western culture…” I always identify myself with it.
traceroute66 5y ago
> Do you ever buy frozen vacuum-sealed fish? The kind where each piece is sealed in its own plastic pouch? It is convenient and delicious. To me it can taste fresher than some "fresh" fish. Eeew. No. Call me old-fashioned but I believe in this thing called seasonality. I only buy fish that is in season, not farmed, and that is genuinely fresh from reputable suppliers, not supermarket "fresh". Nice clear bright eyes, clean gills and all that jazz. There is no substitute for fresh fresh fish. Well, maybe one ... high-quality smoked fish.
- the_af 5y ago
  > I only buy fish that is in season, not farmed, and that is genuinely fresh from reputable suppliers, not supermarket "fresh". I think everyone wants this, but it's not always practical. Not everyone lives in a coastal area with access to fresh fish of the kind they would like to eat. If you do, more power to you! But if you don't... Freezing fish also has the benefit that it kills parasites.
- BoxOfRain 5y ago
  >There is no substitute for fresh fresh fish. Well, maybe one ... high-quality smoked fish. While I take a bit less of a strong stance on this, I definitely agree there's nothing like properly fresh fish. I used to think I didn't really like mackerel but the truth is that supermarket mackerel can be a bit nasty even off the fish counter, mackerel straight out of the sea and cooked right away is absolutely fantastic.
  - traceroute66 5y ago
    > I used to think I didn't really like mackerel but the truth is that supermarket mackerel can be a bit nasty even off the fish counter Yes. Oily fish (e.g. mackerel) really doesn't keep well, as you say it has to be eaten as close to "straight out of the sea" as possible. Oily fish certainly is not well suited to supermarket supply chains.
    - nradov 5y ago
      For those in the Bay Area, the Hankook Korean supermarket in Sunnyvale always has good fresh mackerel. http://www.hankooksupermarket.com/products.htm http://www.hankooksupermarket.com/products.htm
Arch-TK 5y ago
Okay, so in the past we've used a sous-vide recirculator set to 30°C to quickly defrost fish which had been vacuum sealed (dodged a bullet apparently). I looked into it and the temperature at which it is safe to hold food without risk of toxin production is 3°C and less. What high-speed defrosting methods are there to replace this? is it okay to just open the fish for 30 minutes, re-seal it and then put it in the recirculator? Really I'm just concerned about a reliable method of defrosting which doesn't take a week. Putting food from the freezer into the fridge has been a hit-and-miss endeavour sometimes taking up to a week.
- toomanybeersies 5y ago
  Back when I used to work in hospitality, we'd defrost fish (both vac sealed and loose) in cold running water. Defrosting vac sealed fish in cold water over 20 minutes and immediately cooking it carries roughly zero risk of botulism, for 2 reasons: 1. The optimal growth temperature for C. botulinum is between 20-45 C [1], exponentially dropping off outside that range. That's why improperly canned food is risky, as it's usually stored in that range for weeks or months. 2. The bacteria is slow growing and doesn't cause illness itself, it also can't grow in the acidic conditions of the adult human gut. Rather, it's the excreted toxin that's dangerous, which takes several days to form [2]. [1] https://www.publish.csiro.au/bi/pdf/bi9530178 https://www.publish.csiro.au/bi/pdf/bi9530178 (p.p. 182) [2] https://journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1128/aem.62.8.3069-3072.1996 https://journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1128/aem.62.8.3069-3072.... (p.p. 3071)
- gambiting 5y ago
  >>I looked into it and the temperature at which it is safe to hold food without risk of toxin production is 3°C and less. The what now? My fridge at home is uniformly at 4C, surely that can't be dangerous.
- weaksauce 5y ago
  quickly defrosting like that is fine wrt botulism but i'm not sure it's great to do that for other bacteria. but you can also just quickly defrost it in a bowl of cool water and use it within a few hours.
superzamp 5y ago
So basically, is sous-vide cooking is a very bad idea?
- ReptileMan 5y ago
  No. Because you are in pasteurized temperatures. Practically always on the outside of the protein. And there are usually no spores inside the muscles
- currency 5y ago
  Sous-vide relies on longer time durations instead of higher temperatures. In most cases, a longer time at a lower temperature is equivalent to a shorter time at a higher temperature in the reduction of pathogenic organisms [0] [0]https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html#Safety https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html#Safety
rainbowzootsuit 5y ago
I think Douglas Baldwin's sous vide guide is a relevant aside to this discussion of pathogens on food. https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html

Chris2048 5y ago

> just right for botulinum and listeria But if it was frozen, wouldn't that kill off any bacteria? Then, as a sealed environment, there wouldn't be anything to grow, even if the environment is just right. edit: ignore this comment, I just read how the spores are resistant to boiling/freezing...

phonypc 5y ago
Freezing doesn't kill bacteria. Reliably, anyway.

antognini 5y ago

I have wondered about this, but even if botulinum or listeria are present, won't they grow very slowly in the refrigerator? I would think that defrosting for 12 hours or so at refrigerator temperatures would still be fairly safe. Or is the quantity that can be dangerous so minute that it doesn't matter?

Uehreka 5y ago
Perhaps its one of those things where “95% of the time you’ll be fine, but be careful if you do it 20 times, because botulism only needs to happen once.”
- jandrese 5y ago
  The fact that most people don't know to remove the plastic and yet there are virtually no reported cases of people being poisoned by wrapped fish suggests that the danger is remote. It probably helps that if you fish get to the point where the bactera become active again it tends to smell bad and discolour.
  - foobarian 5y ago
    I think if the fish was consumed raw there would be a lot more cases. But the toxin is destroyed by cooking even if the spores do grow.
- mdp2021 5y ago
  > be careful if you do it 20 times Probably just a locution, but be careful with that idea about numbers: The probability of remaining in a safe zone of 95% for 20 consecutive times is ~36%. It ( (1-(1/n))^n ) approximates to 1/e. The number of tries to reduce that 95% to a 50% coin toss is 13. It is not fully intuitive. One will put his threshold wherever one may think appropriate, but. A chance of tenth, a hundredth, a thousandth etc. for ten, a hundred, thousand etc. times approximates to 63.2%. ...Maybe a locution like 'Maybe 9 out of 10 times you'll be fine, but be careful about doing it 7 times' could work well (as 6.931 approximates the risk to a coin toss).
  - cseleborg 5y ago
    So that explains the seven lives of cats, who 9 times out of 10 land on their feet. (Also, 85% of statistics are made up on the spot.)
  - dredmorbius 5y ago

gibolt 5y ago

This is similar for red meat. Vacuum sealed at the source will keep it fresh longer. Here is a great video on what color meat should be to be considered 'fresh' and how to handle it from there: https://youtu.be/82KT_nb26-4 https://youtu.be/82KT_nb26-4 The rest of the channel is great if you are at all into cooking.

Helmut10001 5y ago

If you put your sealed fish in cold tap water, it will thaw in less than 15 Minutes. 15 Minutes is not enough for the bacteria to produce these toxins.

glenstein 5y ago
Right, that was going to be my question. Wouldn't botulism etc need a certain amount of time to grow? Is any normal use case of defrosting in a microwave long enough for that to happen? Is there a safe zone of X minutes, and then an unsafe zone of Y minutes where it gets dangerous?
- Helmut10001 5y ago
  Fast defrosting in Microwave or sealed, in cold water, is at least better than some of the other suggestions, like poking the seal and slow defrosting over 24 hours in the fridge. In the fridge and without a seal, the effects of exposing fish to other bacteria are really difficult to control.
- weaksauce 5y ago
  it takes days for the botulism to grow under a vacuum in your fridge depending on temp.(a proper fridge should be 35-40F but many are much higher than that. 50F takes 2 days or so to form) https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in-vacuum-packed-bag https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in...
  - Helmut10001 5y ago
    I know - I was referring to other bacteria in your fridge (such as Listeria etc.)(not in your fridge particularly).

turbinerneiter 5y ago

I defrost my fish in the package by putting it in hot tap water. You, sire, drastically reduced my chance of dying. Thank you very much.

seszett 5y ago
Put it in cold tap water in the fridge and it will also defrost much faster than in the air, while staying at a safe temperature the whole time and it also won't be partly cooked already.
bambax 5y ago
Do not do that. Defrosting should be done slowly in the fridge. Or you can cook frozen food directly. But do not defrost at or about room temperature, this will breed bacteria like crazy.
- baobabKoodaa 5y ago
  Wouldn't the food need to warm up to room temperature before bacteria would breed like crazy? If you defrost it from frozen to cold-but-defrosted, shouldn't you be ok, even if the surrounding air is room temperature?
  - dustintrex 5y ago
    The issue is the timing. If you defrost in the fridge, it will eventually reach ambient temperature, but that's still safe. If you defrost on the counter, it will briefly be cold-but-defrosted, but rapidly progress to room-temperature-petri-dish.
  - bambax 5y ago
    > If you defrost it from frozen to cold-but-defrosted, shouldn't you be ok, even if the surrounding air is room temperature Yes, that's my point. If you defrost in the fridge it's ok. If you defrost at room temperature then it's dangerous. It's not extremely dangerous. Many people do it every day and don't die. But it's better not to.

dustintrex 5y ago

Is this really a risk in practice though? I can't find any cases of this actually happening on the CDC's botulism site: https://www.cdc.gov/botulism/surveillance.html https://www.cdc.gov/botulism/surveillance.html

2-718-281-828 5y ago
might become a risk if it lies around defrosted for many hours.
ckastner 5y ago
I am somewhat skeptical of this as well. It's not uncommon to hear of someone having eaten something "bad", but that can be the result of many pathogens and with regards to botulinum, the article gives a data point: > In the UK, between 1990 and 2005, there were 5 reported cases affecting 6 people and causing 2 deaths, meaning that you were 15 times more likely to be hit by lightning.
- koheripbal 5y ago
  That data is clearly only reporting very serious cases though, since one third of them died. Food poisoning is much more common than lightning.
  - ckastner 5y ago
    > Food poisoning is much more common than lightning. I said as much. The question is whether botulism is more common than lightning. Food poisoning is not uncommon, but can be caused by many pathogens, for example E. coli. Given the fact that we have a common illness but very few confirmations of C. botulinum as the cause, the question stands whether this is really a risk in practice.
weaksauce 5y ago
it's a risk for certain fish and if you defrost the fish in the fridge for days... but as it stands botulism is not a very common thing to worry about in modern society. there are about 200 poisonings per year in the us. a lot are junkies using shared and dirty needles... babies eating honey is another large one. maybe about 20-50 per year in the us is an adult getting food borne botulism. in any event yes it is risky to defrost the fish in a vacuum sealed bag but only if you thaw it for a few days or more like that. 50F fridge is about 2 days and 45F fridge is a few more days before there is growth: https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in-vacuum-packed-bag https://www.riskyornot.co/episodes/34-thawing-frozen-fish-in... Fwiw i just thaw it the day i use it in cold water for < 1hr and it's almost certainly fine to use that day.

AussieWog93 5y ago

Any people from developing countries reading this thread? What are your thoughts when you hear Westerners talking about the danger of leaving a meat out of the fridge for a couple of hours and stuff like that?

kaetemi 5y ago
My wife leaves meat out of the fridge for the practically the whole day...
swiftcoder 5y ago
As long as it’s not vacuum sealed, you can leave it on the counter all day. Even in the west we defrost meat this way :)
- IntrepidWorm 5y ago
  Ahhh... Don't tell the health department. :)
- astura 5y ago
  No "we" don't. That is expressly against USDA guidelines that say meat left in the danger zone[1] for more than 2 hours should not be consumed. I don't eat meat, but my husband does, and he defrosts his meat in the fridge. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_zone_(food_safety) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_zone_(food_safety)
martopix 5y ago
We are talking about leaving meat out of the fridge in a sealed anaerobic environment, which is quite different.
soneca 5y ago
No thoughts about the fish, but I was recently very surprised to learn that some people exclude my country, Brazil, from “western” culture. Like you did opposing “developing” and “westerners”. Aside from geographical position, I certainly feel closer in culture to North America and Europe than to Middle-East or East-Asia cultures. Every time I hear a statement with ”in the western culture…” I always identify myself with it.

traceroute66 5y ago

> Do you ever buy frozen vacuum-sealed fish? The kind where each piece is sealed in its own plastic pouch? It is convenient and delicious. To me it can taste fresher than some "fresh" fish. Eeew. No. Call me old-fashioned but I believe in this thing called seasonality. I only buy fish that is in season, not farmed, and that is genuinely fresh from reputable suppliers, not supermarket "fresh". Nice clear bright eyes, clean gills and all that jazz. There is no substitute for fresh fresh fish. Well, maybe one ... high-quality smoked fish.

the_af 5y ago
> I only buy fish that is in season, not farmed, and that is genuinely fresh from reputable suppliers, not supermarket "fresh". I think everyone wants this, but it's not always practical. Not everyone lives in a coastal area with access to fresh fish of the kind they would like to eat. If you do, more power to you! But if you don't... Freezing fish also has the benefit that it kills parasites.
BoxOfRain 5y ago
>There is no substitute for fresh fresh fish. Well, maybe one ... high-quality smoked fish. While I take a bit less of a strong stance on this, I definitely agree there's nothing like properly fresh fish. I used to think I didn't really like mackerel but the truth is that supermarket mackerel can be a bit nasty even off the fish counter, mackerel straight out of the sea and cooked right away is absolutely fantastic.
- traceroute66 5y ago
  > I used to think I didn't really like mackerel but the truth is that supermarket mackerel can be a bit nasty even off the fish counter Yes. Oily fish (e.g. mackerel) really doesn't keep well, as you say it has to be eaten as close to "straight out of the sea" as possible. Oily fish certainly is not well suited to supermarket supply chains.
  - nradov 5y ago
    For those in the Bay Area, the Hankook Korean supermarket in Sunnyvale always has good fresh mackerel. http://www.hankooksupermarket.com/products.htm http://www.hankooksupermarket.com/products.htm

Arch-TK 5y ago

Okay, so in the past we've used a sous-vide recirculator set to 30°C to quickly defrost fish which had been vacuum sealed (dodged a bullet apparently). I looked into it and the temperature at which it is safe to hold food without risk of toxin production is 3°C and less. What high-speed defrosting methods are there to replace this? is it okay to just open the fish for 30 minutes, re-seal it and then put it in the recirculator? Really I'm just concerned about a reliable method of defrosting which doesn't take a week. Putting food from the freezer into the fridge has been a hit-and-miss endeavour sometimes taking up to a week.

toomanybeersies 5y ago
Back when I used to work in hospitality, we'd defrost fish (both vac sealed and loose) in cold running water. Defrosting vac sealed fish in cold water over 20 minutes and immediately cooking it carries roughly zero risk of botulism, for 2 reasons: 1. The optimal growth temperature for C. botulinum is between 20-45 C [1], exponentially dropping off outside that range. That's why improperly canned food is risky, as it's usually stored in that range for weeks or months. 2. The bacteria is slow growing and doesn't cause illness itself, it also can't grow in the acidic conditions of the adult human gut. Rather, it's the excreted toxin that's dangerous, which takes several days to form [2]. [1] https://www.publish.csiro.au/bi/pdf/bi9530178 https://www.publish.csiro.au/bi/pdf/bi9530178 (p.p. 182) [2] https://journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1128/aem.62.8.3069-3072.1996 https://journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1128/aem.62.8.3069-3072.... (p.p. 3071)
gambiting 5y ago
>>I looked into it and the temperature at which it is safe to hold food without risk of toxin production is 3°C and less. The what now? My fridge at home is uniformly at 4C, surely that can't be dangerous.
weaksauce 5y ago
quickly defrosting like that is fine wrt botulism but i'm not sure it's great to do that for other bacteria. but you can also just quickly defrost it in a bowl of cool water and use it within a few hours.

superzamp 5y ago

So basically, is sous-vide cooking is a very bad idea?

ReptileMan 5y ago
No. Because you are in pasteurized temperatures. Practically always on the outside of the protein. And there are usually no spores inside the muscles
currency 5y ago
Sous-vide relies on longer time durations instead of higher temperatures. In most cases, a longer time at a lower temperature is equivalent to a shorter time at a higher temperature in the reduction of pathogenic organisms [0] [0]https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html#Safety https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html#Safety

rainbowzootsuit 5y ago

I think Douglas Baldwin's sous vide guide is a relevant aside to this discussion of pathogens on food. https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html https://douglasbaldwin.com/sous-vide.html