h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

antigravitas, if you're going to compare the energy costs of bulk cooking as opposed to making fresh frequently, don't forget t to compare the energy costs of cooking as well as keeping food cold. I must admit I can't see an economic argument against bulk cooking.

I think you're also confusing gastroenteritis with food poisoning. The former is a common infection, related as you say, to poor hygiene. usually self-limiting and not life threatening unless you are already debilitated. Food poisoning stems from eating infected meat & any amount of hand washing etc will not stop you catching it, although it may prevent transmission between foodstuffs.

Az, do you do dumplings? I love a lamb stew with herby dumplings... *sigh*

I know what I'm asking mum to make for my birthday dinner now!

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Nope. My fridge is always on no matter how much food is in it - also, fridges run more efficiently when they are fuller.

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Good point, Teasswill.

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OMG! I've never made a lamb stew, Deakie. I think that's going to be on the menu next week.

az

Oops, that was you Robyn - sorry!

Great suggestion.


az

A3347066

Thanks Orcus - that looks good. And water, not stock, eh? Live and learn - I always use some kind of stock in my stews but I can try it without and see what happens.

az

Well I think stock would not hurt... It does say, there is no right way

Too late to add much, but what the heck, I spent time on this post....

This is cooked chicken stew, not raw chicken. The really nasty bugs are already dead. The stew may then breed a few of the benign ones if left out for a while, but it'll do that in the fridge too. It's not a simple case of in fridge=safe, out of fridge=unsafe. You should reheat thoroughly either way. It is a very different scenario to a restaurant kitchen where both raw and cooked meats are flying around at the same time.

I often leave large pans of stuff like stew and stock out to cool overnight. The fat will form a seal on top keeping bugs and oxygen out, which is another perfectly acceptable method of food preservation (a confit, effectively). The fat can be skimmed off later if necessary, though I tend not to cause you lose a lot of the flavour. In the UK at this time of year the temperature is comparable to that in the fridge anyway.

"and these bugs aren't different bugs to the ones which MIGHT infect poorly stored food."

Actually most of them are. The reason why the average chopping board harbours more bugs than the average toilet seat and yet people aren't dropping like flies, is because they're different bugs. The reason kids can eat mud without dying from rotting intestines is that most soil bacteria are considerably less dangerous that E Coli and Salmonella.

Hee hee! Hi dave!

I think, regarding the 'no stock' thing with the irish stew is that because you are initially boiling the shanks (including the bones, and all that lovely marrow) you are creating the stock with the first stage of cooking... Then effectively removing the bones and adding veg and any seasoning.

Still no mention of dumplings though

Interesting post, Dave - thanks.

I always wash my cutting boards with the hottest water that comes out of my tap - which is actually a bit too hot for my hands. But I agree with you and Roymondo that ingesting a certain amount of 'bugs' is necessary to maintain our natural resistance to them. Much like allergy jabs contain a small portion of what the person is allergic to.

The night the stew was left out I think the overnight temperature in the apartment was 13-15º (no central heating at casa az) ... not refridgerator temperature but not overly warm either.

Yeah, I tend not to skim the fat off either, if there isn't too much of it, because you're right that this is where a lot of the flavour is stored.

It's been very interesting to read the responses here to my initial question (which was wondering if keeping the stew out that one night would affect it's 'shelf life' in the fridge for the week). Clearly some people feel very strongly about food and food preparation. And all comments were welcome.

I didn't mean to single out antigravitas, it was just that his/her posts seemed more directed at my ability to cook properly. So I apologise if my replies sounded defensive - I think we were often talking at cross purposes. Stew vs stock, etc.

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I used to wonder if my bad habit of chewing my fingernails as a child actually helped build up my immune system, because I rarely get ill or catch whatever happens to be 'going around'. I've never had food poisoning, which as Teasswill pointed out, is due to infected meat (or seafood). And the only instance of 'gastro' I've ever had I put down to sprinkling *way too many* red hot chili pepper flakes on my food one night ... oooh, that one HURT!

az

Do you have a good dumpling recipe, Robyn? Gosh, haven't had dumplings since I was a kid.


az

I dont I'll have to ask me mum

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Thanks for the suggestion, antigravitas. I have done so.


az

Sorry, should have posted the link - it's on the Science Explained forum (aka SEx)

F2124165?thread=5047132

I await scientific enlightenment.

az

E coli is generally about as benign a bacterium as you are going to get.
In fact you have lots inside you at all times.

In the labs in which I work we use it all the time and it is a class I biohazard. Which makes it more dangerous than ice cream. Only when you go to classes 2 to 4 are you in the realms of dangerous pathogens (anthrax is class 4 for example).

What people confuse is the *specific* strain of E. coli denoted O157 which *is* a serious pathogen. But this is a rarely occuring species and is usually found when people start dropping dead from it and it gets spread all over the tabloids.

The most common dangerous pathogenic 'food poisoning' bugs as far as I'm aware are Campylobacter, Salmonella and Lysteria

http://www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/articles/article.aspx?articleId=411&sectionId=5

So far it seems that keeping one's fridge full - but not to ultimum capacity - is the best way of maintaining efficiency.

So the question of how long something is kept in one's fridge isn't really a consideration. In terms of energy used.

az

Thanks for that info, Orcus. Ste also edited a very good guide entry on E.coli, if anyone is interested...

A1048385


az

Wow, that *is* a good article. Didn't know about that.

"the *specific* strain of E. coli denoted O157 which *is* a serious pathogen"

Which is, of course, what I meant

Well, I know that Ste did a lot of work on it and was rightly proud of the result, Orcus.

Meanwhile, I asked Nog if he preferred salmonella or botulism for lunch today and he said he didn't mind. He opted for the potato salad we've had in the fridge since Monday and commented on how the spring onion flavour was much more integrated than it was a couple of days ago.

Gosh, hope he doesn't drop dead while he's out teaching!


az