Eighty degree refrigerator

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Smarty Pants! :LOL:

I have never mastered the art of bread making, and now I'm too crippled up to worry about it.

This is why it's so important that we teach the whole world to bake their own bread. I bake bread so I don't have time to go to the beer joint and get into trouble. More men should bake bread...

BTW, I did have food poisoning in 1972, and I will never forget that episode. It came from a sandwich with mayo that spoiled. It was teh only time in my life that I truly wanted to die. It was horrible, nasty, outrageous, miserable, violent, gut-wrenching, etc, etc.... Swallow the pride and pitch the bad food.
 
Oh Pacanis!! Your cheeses are (or would have been if you'd kept them) absolutely & perfectly fine. Even the cream cheese. Same goes for the Pico de Gallo.

As far as the chili, if you had said 50-60 degrees, I probably would've chanced it. But that's just me. Eighty degrees?? I'd toss it. And just out of curiosity, even with the door ajar, how the heck did the interior of your fridge ever reach 80 degrees?? Is that the temp inside your house?
 
And just out of curiosity, even with the door ajar, how the heck did the interior of your fridge ever reach 80 degrees?? Is that the temp inside your house?

If the door does not close all the way, the light stays on and the heat gain begins. A fridge is not a very large space, and a single light bulb can heat it up very quickly. Remember the kids baking oven that could make a small cake using just a light bulb? That's how it gets that warm that quick.
 
Yea pacanis... I would been in cooking mode... using that cheese. Plus most recipes using cream cheese says to bring to room temp, although I know most folks don't keep their homes at 80 degrees!
 
If the door does not close all the way, the light stays on and the heat gain begins. A fridge is not a very large space, and a single light bulb can heat it up very quickly. Remember the kids baking oven that could make a small cake using just a light bulb? That's how it gets that warm that quick.

Sorry - I don't buy that. First off, the "Easy Bake Oven" was/is a tiny little thing Second, fridges - mine at least - have one small light bulb at the top encased in plastic. Eighty degrees in a period of what, maybe 12 hours tops, with the door ajar for a free exchange of air? I still find it odd unless the OP keeps his/her house outrageously warm.

But regardless - my feelings re: the food safety remain the same.;)
 
I seem to remember reading about someone dying from botulism poisoning by eating chili that was left out for about 12 hrs. There is no way I would chance it...
 
To clear up a little confusion, the only cheeses I pitched were the blue cheese ones and the parmesan, which just hit me I forgot to replace (shoot). I still have the cream cheese and cheddar. So I guess I'm good there. I've still got the pico, so OK, I guess I'm good there, too. And a tomato..... I kept a tomato. Plus of course the butters.
And I've still got that chili..........
Milk, gravy, condiments, sauces, syrup, dressings, bacon, ham, veggies, thawing meatloaf, leftover steak, sour cream..... everything else got pitched and is irretrievable cuz I don't go through garbage. Not even my own ;^)

Breezy, I keep my house that warm downstairs. And it's about ten degreees cooler upstairs in the bedroom. Still, eighty in the fridge surprised me only because it was obviously running all that time, so you would think it would maintain some kind of coolness...... and the DO did feel cool (it was on the bottom shelf), but not fridge cold. I probably should have checked the chili with a thermometer, but didn't think about it at the time. I know the bottom shelf was colder than the top shelf where the refrigerator thermometer was. Maybe Joe's lightbulb theory does have merit.

I still don't understand why I couldn't bring the chili back up to simmering temp for a couple hours and kill any nasties that might have started. I can see not risking it though. I'm on the fence.

Oh, and I was "this close" to putting the chili out on the porch deck last night, but I didn't want to chance having it freeze. How ironic is that (lol).
 
RobsanX - you must have read or are remembering incorrectly, as Botulism poisoning doesn't happen that way. You don't get Botulism poisoning from food left out for 12 hours unless it was in the food to begin with. In which case you would have been poisoned long before you had a chance to enjoy the left-out leftovers.
 
Actually, the blue cheese & parmesan are two of the very safest things you could have saved. In fact, ANY aged cheese would have been just fine. What made you toss them right away? Sour cream most likely would have been fine too.

And there's a very simple explanation re: the temp difference between the upper & lower fridge shelves that have nothing to do with the "light bulb theory": warm air rises; cold air sinks.

Wow - you keep your house at 80 degrees? Glad I'm not paying your heating bill - lol!!
 
I don't know. Between the other fridge on the fritz threads and the don't take a chance advice, I figured the blue cheese containers were one of the easy things to get rid of. Not like that chili that contained the pork butt I spent 16 hours on last week....

Yeah, but the refrigerator has a fan to move the air, the freezer is on top, the meat drawer in the middle (cooler temps) and the door was ajar the whole vertical length. I still would think the temps would equalize top to bottom unless there was a heat source somewhere (the bulb). I hope I don't get to test that theory again though (lol).

I have a poorly made farmhouse (that I insulated) and its climate is uneven everywhere. I need to keep it more warm in some areas to be comfortable in others. Fortunately, I also have a gas well. Still, where the refrigerator sits is right next to a mudroom that isn't heated, so it would not be that warm in that part of the kitchen. Something was causing some heat.
 
Hmmm.....throw everything out, none of it safe. The preceding was a public service announcement.

I see it's hours after your initial post. I would have suggested you reheat that chili to 165 immediately, and then chill it quickly, in shallow pans. If you didn't do that, you are taking a risk by eating it, regardless of when you reheat it. There is the letter of the law when dealing with the public, and then there is what you are willing to risk when dealing with your life and those around you. It's your call.
 
Gee Pacanis, that stinks. My fridge died this summer the night before leaving for vacation. I didn't have a lot in there but tossed my collection of condiments!

As for your chili......may it R.I.P :(
 
The condiments were probably one of the safest things you could have kept. Most do not even need to be stored in the fridge in the first place (regardless of what it says on the packaging). Ketchup, mustard, soy sauce, etc. can all be kept safely in the cupboard.
 
And that's what keeps me hanging onto the thought my chili might still be good, GB, though I'll probably toss it. One way or another.
If catsup would still be good with being cold and heating up and cooling back down, why not tomato based chili? Yeah, it's got other stuff in it.... but still..... I've eaten room temperature pizza without ill effect....

Oh well. Decisions, decisions.
 
GB, I tossed everything since I would be gone for three weeks in the heat of summer. I wasn't so concerned with some of them but decided to be safe. Some of the relishes and chutneys just didn't seem like something worth keeping. In the months since then I have replaced everything in the fridge.
 
If catsup would still be good with being cold and heating up and cooling back down, why not tomato based chili? Yeah, it's got other stuff in it.... but still
You are comparing apples to oranges. Like you said, it has other stuff in it. You can not just dismiss that "other stuff" with a wave of the hand as if it does not exist or does not matter. That "other stuff" can cause you a world of trouble. Not to mention that ketchup is different than tomatoe bases chili. There are other things in other concentrations present in ketchup that are not present in your chili. There is a large amount of acid and sugar and salt in concentrations that are not present in your chili. Ketchup is not chili. They might share some of the same ingredients, but they are not the same.

I've eaten room temperature pizza without ill effect....
Just because you have played Russian Roulette (assuming your room temp pizza was left out longer than just a few hours) and won does not mean it is a safe practice. I know people who have driven for years without a seat belt with no ill effect. No matter what, you will never convince me that is safe. As soon as one of those people gets into a car accident their tune will change, but at that point it is too late.
 
I still don't understand why I couldn't bring the chili back up to simmering temp for a couple hours and kill any nasties that might have started. I can see not risking it though. I'm on the fence.

Oh, and I was "this close" to putting the chili out on the porch deck last night, but I didn't want to chance having it freeze. How ironic is that (lol).

I don't really see much danger here, frankly. I am assuming that you didn't start with dried beans. That would open up the possibility of Clostridium perfringens spores surviving the first cooking and becoming vegetative bacteria in the refrigerator.

Absent that, you are correct that heating to boiling, even for 5 minutes will kill any bacteria that you may have contaminated the chili with after cooking.

Your only real danger would be Staph aureus toxin, if you contaminated the chili with Staph bacteria after cooking, and the PH was high enough to allow bacterial growth.

Although Chili has a lot of tomato products in it usually, it has a lot of other more neutral products too, like meat, beans and so on. I am not convinced that the PH would be low enough to be safe from Staph.

So there is some risk and that probably means throw it out to some or not to others. You will have to decide, but the risk is low unless you had an open cut while you were cooking ( a good way to transmit staph)
 
Open cut? Well, I did briefly Mozart, but I super glued it and no blood touched anything.
So you can transmit staph without having a staph infection?
 
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