I'm disabled and have a person help with groceries and meals. Today, she bought roast beef at the grocery store and immediately put together a beef stew for me (no time in fridge at home), but she didn't notice the crockpot was unplugged. I discovered it about 3 1/2 hours later and plugged it in. Should I let the stew finish cooking or throw it out? Keep in mind if I throw it out, I won't have dinner for the next 3 days and will be living on cereal and Halloween candy. Not an exaggeration.
21
If I left food out of the refrigerator for some period of time, is it still safe? If I left it out too long, can I salvage it by cooking it more?
43342
Now I feel sick. I wish I [didn't eat/hadn't eaten] pork with cheese for dinner.   I would use "hadn't eaten" as it was my dinner but "now I feel sick" confuses me.
37951
I have a  that I'd like to cook tomorrow, and I'm planning to do it in my slow cooker.  The recipe as provided online is the same one that is on the turkey packaging:     Slow-Cooker Instructions:   Place THAWED roast, skin side up, flat in 8” diameter slow-cooker. Add 1/2 cup water. Cover, cook on low 7-1/2 hours to internal temperature of 170 degrees as measured with a meat thermometer. After 4 hours, check temperature at center, ends and near top for food safety. Turkey must reach 140 degrees within 4 hours.    Now, I haven't done a lot of slow cooking before, but when I have, I've always added enough liquid to fill the slow cooker up to about 3/4 full.  Half a cup of water will barely cover the bottom of my slow cooker.  I did some research, but found nothing conclusive.   say that slow cookers should always be more than half full,  seem to indicate that it's fine to run them almost empty.  Is there a minimum level of liquid necessary when cooking in a slow cooker?
35303
Just cooked some chicken breasts today. All day in the crockpot and when done the meat was horribly dry.  I put chopped onions, carrots, spices, and coconut milk and 1/2 cup water and 4 chicken breasts.  There was plenty of fluid there when it was done, but the cooked chicken meat was really dry.  This seems to happen with beef roast as well.  Is there some trick to getting meat to be tender when cooking in the crockpot?
9439
I generally defrost meat on the kitchen counter. A friend of mine suggested that this was dangerous and suggested that I defrost meat in the refrigerator. I am no biologist but it seems to me that as long as the meat doesn't get warm defrosting it on the counter should be safe.  Generally, I remove the frozen items from the freezer and place them on a plate on the counter in the packaging they were frozen in. When they are mostly / completely thawed I place the meat in the refrigerator.  Am I wrong and should I be defrosting in the refrigerator?
15493
I pulled a chicken out of the freezer a couple of days ago with the intention of making stock/soup. It's defrosted now and ready to go, but I don't have the mirepoix ingredients and I'm too lazy to go to the store for just that. Since it's just now defrosted, I've got a few days, right?  What if I'm still too lazy to go to the store three days from now, so I roast the chicken close to its maximum expected "still fresh" time and then refrigerate the cooked chicken? Would that effectively "restart the clock"? Lets say I hold on to the cooked chicken for three days before finally getting around to making the stock. Would it be right to expect that stock to have the same shelf life as it would have had if I had made the stock with the freshly defrosted chicken?   For the sake of this question, assume that the chicken was frozen immediately upon purchase, defrosted in the refrigerator, roasted to an internal temperature of at least 165F, rested, then promptly refrigerated.  I could ask the same of a beef stew. Can I cook the meat to give me more time before I put together the stew?  In both of these cases I'd expect a certain quality loss, so I am more concerned about safety than optimum flavor or texture.
64040
We went on vacation and while we were gone, the refrigerator in which I stored a GREAT DEAL of cheese (both hard and soft, although unopened) quit working and when we returned home, I found the cheese defrosted (I had put it in the freezer).  Is it safe to transfer to my other refrigerator?  The packages are unopened and there is no indication of spoilage.
75392
My roommate put a hunk of beef roast in the slow-cooker for a good 6 hours.  It's a fairly large sized slow-cooker, at least 8 quarts.  The meat was cooked through but very chewy, and I never remember my mom having that issue with a slow-cooker.  My roommate tends to put only enough water to get halfway up the side of the roast, and always uses a slow-cooker 'bag' (another thing my mom never did).  What advice can I offer them to get a better outcome?
98784
I've soaked some beans in room temperature water overnight, since 6pm (white navy beans).    How long can I keep them in water before I must use them?   Will they last a day or so at room temperature and in water, or should I drain and store in the fridge, or must I cook with them immediately?
13503
What are the general rules regarding when can you refreeze food that was frozen and then thawed in the fridge? and what are the reasons behind them? (Hygiene? Food quality?). Let's assume for the sake of the argument that the items were in a non-frozen state only a few hours.  To be more specific, I'm interested in the application of these rules for  - Ginger garlic paste - Dough - Indian Curries - Green Chilly paste - Frozen green peas
23470
I kept all of the bacon grease from making bacon this weekend, and now I have a jar of solidified grease in the fridge. How long can I use this to impart bacony goodness to my fried vegetables before it goes bad?  What is the shelf life of the fat drippings from bacon, roast and other meats?
81721
I have fallen into a slump at the minute where i just don't feel like preparing food when i get home from work, and i would prefer to cut up a larger batch of potatoes in one go and store them in the fridge/freezer in the correct portion sizes, so when i get home i can just throw them into the oven.  The problem i have had with this up to now is, if i put them into the freezer and then try to cook them, the defrosting process turns them to mush. If i put them in the fridge, they have gone off by morning.  Is there a better way to store potatoes that have been cut up?
117685
I'm the kind of chef who chops up whatever the local bazaar has that week, adds a random amount of seasonings until the color suits my fancy and then cooks it. Somehow. Most days I don't go hungry.  The other day, fresh garlic was really cheap so I bought a bunch. The housewares shop had some little jugs with corks, so I picked one up. Back at home I chopped up a few heads of garlic, stuffed it the jug, then filled the jug with olive oil. Bread for the next two days had had a great dipping sauce! However dipping bread in oil uses up a lot of oil and not very much garlic, so on the second evening when it was about half empty I topped off the jug with fresh oil. I corked it, wiped off the drips from around the top with a paper towel and left it on the table.  This is what I found in the morning. (click for larger)    I am certain when I corked it the level of oil was below the bottom of the cork because I tipped it to see how the garlic was getting an and remember the air moving around in the jug. I am also certain the top was clean having wiped it off, and of course there was no puddle. Even stranger, as I have left it there today it has continued to drip.  The only clew seems to be garlic mixture seems to be producing periodic bubbles that float up through the oil. This does not explain to me how the oil got out, but it does seem like it must be producing   I see three fields for questioning:   Casual kitchen tinkerer: How should I safely store my garlic and olive oil? Is there danger to storing this in something that seals better than a plastic cork? Is it safe to eat? Amateur chemist: Is there a chemical reaction going on between the garlic and the oil? Would it ever explode? Wannabe physicist: How did the oil get out? This seems like a gravity defying stunt. Note the current oil level is about ½" below the cork.   Somebody please tell me why my day's adventure at the bazaar made this much mess and how to make yummy things with garlic and olive oil safely!
69444
How many hours/days would you recommend to drink coffee (after brewed) and consider it safe? (For example if you don't want to waste it). What is the difference if it is refrigerated or not?  The question is not about flavor since (I think) it is probably ruined after at most a couple of hours.
73440
I'm a bit scared to try it, because I'm not sure what would be worse--cracking open a rotten egg, or having to figure out what to do with a chick.  So how about it?  If I leave chicken eggs out, will they eventually hatch if kept at the right temperature?  EDIT - Sorry for the confusion.  I was referring to store bought eggs only.
120367
I live alone, so I cook for myself. And often times I cook steaks/burgers on a pan, and later in the same day would return to use the same pan/oil without washing/using new oil.  Is this safe, or should one wash and use a new pan before cooking every steak/burger patties? I've actually done this for more than a day once (cooked burgers in the morning, steaks later that afternoon, and then burgers for the next morning).
69228
This is partly a continuation of  question, since that one was already closed, but my question is about a specific problem encountered the last time I cooked scallops.  I got the pan up to a reasonable temperature and put the scallops in, and as they were cooking, TONS of water came out of the scallops and filled the pan.  I poured it out, continued cooking, and more water came out.  Several iterations later, I thought they were done, but they were still very raw inside, so we ended up tossing the batch (it definitely wasn't sushi grade).  Where did all the liquid come from, and is there any way to avoid that the next time?