I know someone was talking about this recently, but I can't find it here. Crockpot safety...

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dawnnys

Well-known member
What did we figure was the safest low temperature for food to cook. I am a fanatic about food poisoning, but I figure it's better to be safe than sorry (now isn't that original! ;o)).

When using a crockpot, it's best to turn it up to HI for the first hour or so, right? So the meat will start to cook quickly and not linger at the lower levels to go bad?

Last night I came home and by accident, I had turned the crockpot off instead of just to LO because it was starting to "look done" too fast. That was at least an hour before we ate, so I threw it out and we got take-out.

How long would you say that the food inside of the crockpot would stay warm safely? Probably the use of a thermometer would be best (to be sure it is still over 150 or so), but the rule-of-thumb 2-hour rule? More? Less?

I know you are supposed to remove the food from the crockpot before storing it beause the liner wouldn't allow the food to cool down quickly enough to prevent bacterial growth, but how long do you say it would stay HOT enough to do that?

 
Dawn, I cook in my crockpot all the time, 5 times in the last 7 days, it's just easier

for us with our lifestyle. I always cook on LO, leaving in the morning and coming home and fixing supper (I have a 6 qt smartpot). I fixed ribs tonight, they were done at 4:00, kept them warm until 5:00. We've never had any problems with food related sickness. I wouldn't have thrown the food out, but I understand how you feel, it didn't seem right to you, so it was best to toss it rather than worrying about it all evening.

 
Dawn, if food has been cooked properly then it can sit for four hours in the "danger zone" of

41* to 140*. So if the crock pot takes less than four hours to heat up past 140*, you're fine. If you turn it off it stays hot for a while because it is well insulated, so yours may not have even fallen below 140, and if it had, it couldn't have gone bad in only one hour.

An instant thermometer is cheap and very reassuring!

The problems occur with putting the warm crockery in the regrigerator. It might not cool down fast enough, especially if it is covered, and it might stay in that lukewarm "danger zone" all night.

 
I was just reading about this in my new book...

With bone-in meat like chicken, ribs, etc...cook on HI for an hour to bring the temperature up quickly. Then turn to LOW for the duration if that's what the recipe calls for. You can keep the food on warm for 4 hours. If you get home and discover that the power in your home had gone out sometime during your absence, throw out the food.

 
Thanks everyone... my concern that it was off for *at least* an hour, and...

it felt only luke-warm to me when I reached in and felt the chicken. Not hot at all - more like 90-100 degrees - and that's why I threw it. I would have left it on LO for hours and hours, cooked, but I wasn't sure being turned "off" would've been ok.

'Still glad I threw it though.

P.S. Interesting Joe, I wouldn't have thought that. I have heard 2 hours.

 
Yes, before I took an obligatory food safety course I worried too much about

just-cooked food, and not enough about refrigerated leftovers.

But "when in doubt, throw it out" is the cardinal rule, and if it was tepid perhaps you did the right thing. You wouldn't have enjoyed it anyway, with the worry.

 
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