Grilling Food Safety

With summer quickly approaching cooking meals outside on the grill starts coming to mind. It's always amazing to me the different flavors that can be obtained from a grill, either gas or charcoal, than you can get cooking in the kitchen. One of the things I like to do before I start grilling is allow the meat to come up close to room temperature before putting it on the grill.

I do know that I have to be careful with this to avoid food poisoning. The CDC estimates [1] that here in the U.S. 48 million people are infected with food borne illness each year (that's more than one out of seven people). Of these 128,000 are hospitalized and 3000 die.

One of the best resources to help with food safety is a book published by the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) called "the professional chef". Actually this book would make a great gift for any young person with a tendency to enjoy cooking even if it's just for themselves.

The CIA indicates that pathogens responsible for food born illness include fungus, parasites, viruses, and bacteria. Of these bacteria is by far the worst for causing illness. To cause an illness there has to be a significant amount of bacteria on the food. To grow and reproduce, the bacteria needs three criteria to be met: a protein source, available water, and time.

The meat warming on my counter that I plan to grill provides the protein source and the water source, nothing I can do there. What I do have control over is time. The temperature range between 41°F (5°C) and 135°F (57°C) is referred to as the danger zone, the temperature zone that supports the growth of bacteria. It's important to understand this is the temperature of the food, not the surroundings.

Professional chefs are taught that food held at temperatures in the danger zone more than 4 hours is spoiled and is not salvageable. The time frame of 4 hours is cumulative throughout the food preparation cycle. So if the butcher leaves my steaks at room temperature for 2 hours and I let them marinate at room temperature for 2 hours, my steaks are potentially dangerous.

Another way to inhibit the bacteria growth is by lowering the pH with a splash of citrus juice. The scale of pH ranges from 1 to 14 with acids being at the low end of the scale. Bacteria grows best in the pH range of 4.3 to 10, and most citrus juices have a pH of around 3. A light coating of lemon juice will help protect your food add a little extra flavor.

There's some of the rules that professional chefs are taught, now it's time to get the grill started.