Alarmist? I’d Say So.
From the National Sanitation Foundation (NSF):
Do you know when your hamburger is cooked sufficiently? Like many people, do you assume it is cooked because it’s brown? According the USDA, one out of every four hamburgers actually turns brown in the middle before it has reached a safe internal temperature!
Admittedly, hamburger can easily carry a higher risk of food-borne illness than other cuts of meat, due to the fact that most of the time bacteria are found mainly at the surface of the meat and ground meat has the surface meat intermingled with everything else. That’s why hamburgers are the only thing I ever order medium-well (I like steaks and roasts medium-rare).
These guidelines are probably quite reasonable for the elderly, small children, pregnant women, or individuals with a weakened immune system. To enact these guidelines for the general population, though, would have us all eating hockey pucks on toast. There’s no reason to cook it ’til it’s charcoal, assuming the ground meat is fresh; and if it’s not fresh, it shouldn’t be served at any temperature, anyway.
When I was in culinary school we had to watch a video for sanitation class that featured consumers who followed all recommended guidelines. There was a woman on it who wouldn’t let her kids eat meat that had any sign of life in it—everything was cooked to an internal temperature of 165 F. I felt bad for those kids, growing up not knowing what a decent, tender steak tastes like or feels like to chew. Almost everyone in my class left that session with the same reaction I had: a realization of the reasons behind the tension between chefs and sanitationists.
Because there is a tension there, and not over reasonable requirements like keep the restaurant kitchen clean and don’t store raw chicken above raw vegetables, but along the lines of sanitationists having a germophobia that restricts them from enjoying proper culinary delights because they’re afraid of even a hint of a possibility of a few surviving microbes.
January 20th, 2007 at 9:22 am
I admit it, I’m one of those foodies who cannot deal with meat that’s underdone. I’m sorry that most chefs appear never to have suffered ill effects from undercooked meat, and thus have cultivated the (fairly recent) attitude that cooked food is somehow overdone. And I’m not talking about microbes, I’m talking about the fact that our bodies have evolved to accept meat that’s cooked, and eating raw meat can cause problems with our internal systems for days on end. But hey, no need for sympathy as to the preferences of the human body, just keep undercooking, don’t mind us.
January 20th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
I’m not a fan of “raw meat,” as you put it; but a warm, dark pink center isn’t raw. There’s a noticeable taste difference between two identical cuts of meat cooked to the med-rare/medium range and one cooked to well done: as in the well done steak requires something poured over it to have any flavor.
In a restaurant, people will cook your meat any way you order it. Just don’t expect sypathy if you order a steak “extra-well done” and then complain that it’s too tough.
Also be prepared to get the end cuts instead of the center cuts. The end cuts are usually somewhat less tender, a quality difference that is made less noticable via complete coagulation of the proteins. That the end cuts are saved for well-done steaks is why many steak houses have notification on their menus that they can’t be held responsible for the quality of well-done pieces of meat.
January 21st, 2007 at 9:30 pm
I think there ought to be a little more tension on the production side, so instead of kitchens bearing the onus for keeping our meat and veggies germ free and uncontaminated, there is also a requirement for the slaughterhouses and feedlots and farms to do not allow animals to stand in giant steaming cesspools of their own feces and don’t smear poop on the raw meat as you cut it up. but you know, POOP IS EVERYWHERE.
January 29th, 2007 at 2:27 am
“Just don’t expect sypathy if you order a steak “extra-well done” and then complain that it’s too tough.”
Can I expect sympathy if I order a steak “well done” rather than “extra-well done” (and do people actually do that)? What about medium-well? Does the sympathy in your estimation travel on a sliding scale, or does it just halt at the well-done level? I really don’t want to get stuck with a crappy cut because of how I want it cooked…
I don’t order steak very often, because I don’t eat it much, but I enjoy a good steak as much as the next guy. I always feel like it’s a gamble though when ordering steak at a restaurant. I always order it medium-well, but what I get is never consistent. The degree of pink-ness varies widely, so I’m never sure what to expect, seems pretty arbitrary in my experience.
I agree that there is a taste difference in how steak is cooked, but I disagree that it’s “wrong” to prefer well/medium-well taste to rare/bloody taste. It seems like rare steak is very much “in fashion” and you aren’t “cool” if you don’t prefer it that way.
Geez, nevermind, I’ll have the chicken.
January 29th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
Surprisingly, people do order steaks “extra-well done;” my remark about expectations of sympathy thereafter were prompted by a banquet held at the restaurant where I work. About half of the people ordered their steaks extra-well; most of the remainder ordered them well. They were upset thereafter that their steaks were somewhat tough, but the more a piece of meat is cooked, the tougher it will become.
Inconsistencies in steak cookery at restaurants probably originate from the volume of steaks being cooked and/or the experience level of the cook—but no matter how experienced a cook is, when things get busy, s/he won’t be able to get every order perfect every time: especially because doneness is a sliding scale; a range of acceptability. That’s why, occasionally, people will send their steaks back.
I’d recommend making the first cut into your steak through its center to see if its doneness matches your range of acceptability. If not, get the waiter’s attention as quickly as possible. It’s a lot fairer to everyone involved if an item is sent back uneaten. That makes it clear you’re not in search of an extra meal on the house; you’re just not satisfied with how your meal was prepared. With any luck, your steak will be on the rare side of your preference, and they can just throw it back in the oven for a couple of minuted to get it up to temp for you, as opposed to cooking a whole new steak.
On the other hand, if it’s too well done and they need to get another one going for you, some places have dubious ways of getting steaks cooked “on the fly.” My previous place of employment, a “gourmet” establishment, would routinely drop steaks in the deep fryer for some color and then cook them in the microwave to get them out rapidly. Definitely not a practice that I endorse, but a practice that is out there, in some (not all!) kitchens.
I’m not the originator of these practices, just the messenger.