No. Wash the plate and tongs used to carry raw meat to the grill, or replace them, before they touch cooked meat. Raw meat juices remain on the plate; placing cooked meat there can undo in one step the safety achieved by cooking. The same rule applies to knives, cutting boards, marinade brushes, and hands. Setting up the workflow in advance makes it easy to follow.
Cooking uses heat to inactivate microorganisms on the surface of meat. 74 °C / 165°F is the target for poultry, 71 °C / 160°F for ground meat, and 63 °C / 145°F for whole cuts of red meat. When cooked meat is placed on a surface that has raw meat juices on it, it picks up what is on that surface, and the cooking has been undone. This mistake is especially common at a grill because the area is crowded, there are few plates, and everyone reaches for things.
The solution is a simple setup. Bring two plates and two pairs of tongs to the grill, and make them easy to tell apart; different colors or sizes are enough. Keep the raw-meat set on one side of the grill and the cooked-meat set on the other, and never switch them. Do not stack the plates. Use the same separation for knives and cutting boards: do not use a board that held raw meat to slice cooked meat until it has been washed.
If you have to work with just one set, clean it between uses. Wash the plate with hot, soapy water and dry it; rinsing with water alone is not enough. Wash the tongs the same way. If there is no water at the grill, a single-use surface is the most practical option for carrying raw meat: place the meat on foil or parchment paper, transfer it to the grill, then discard the paper so the plate underneath stays clean. Keep the dish that held raw meat beside the grill until it can be washed; do not bring it straight to the table.
Hands are part of this chain, too. Wash hands that have touched raw meat before touching bread, salad, a drink glass, or the grill lid. If there is no water, a wet wipe and hand sanitizer are temporary options, but they do not replace washing. Do not use a marinade brush on cooked meat after it has touched raw meat; use a separate brush, or brush the meat for the last time before taking it off the heat, so the liquid is cooked as well. The same rule applies in the refrigerator: keep raw meat on the lowest shelf in a covered container so it cannot drip onto foods below.
There is also a time rule for grilling. Do not leave cooked meat at room temperature for more than 2 hours; if the air temperature is above 30 °C / 86°F, reduce that time to 1 hour. For a long meal, cook meat in smaller batches instead of taking everything off the grill at once and leaving it out. Do not leave raw meat in the sun beside the grill; keep it in a cooler or insulated bag and take it out only when it is its turn to cook. Refrigerate leftover meat within 2 hours. At a large gathering, it also helps to assign one person to manage this, since fewer hands touching the grill means fewer opportunities for mix-ups.
Comments (2)
Mangalda iki maşa götürmek kolay da kalabalıkta kimse hangisinin hangisi olduğunu hatırlamıyor. Ben maşalardan birinin sapına kırmızı bant sardım, karışıklık bitti. Aynı düzeni tabaklarda da kurdum, çiğ et hep aynı renkte tabakla gidiyor.
Suyla çalkalamak yetmez uyarısı yerinde; yağlı tabak zaten soğuk suda temizlenmiyor.