[Sca-cooks] Long do meat pasties keep?

[Daniel Myers]

On Friday, May 16, 2003, at 01:19 PM, david friedman wrote:

> Someone emailed me asking how long it was safe to keep meat pasties
> at an event before eating them. I didn't have much useful to say, so
> offered to post the question here for comments, and am now doing so.

I have two different answers to this, depending on whether I'm serving
just myself, or others as well.

If it's just me, if the meat was completely cooked all the way through
(killing all the bacteria) and if the crust is completely sealed around
the meat (so no new bacteria can get in), then I wouldn't worry about
an hour or so unrefrigerated.  Remember that workers in the coal mines
used to take these things for their lunches, and their lunch boxes
certainly weren't refrigerated (and weren't early period pies were said
to have been left on the pantry shelf for weeks?).

HOWEVER, I do not want to take the chance of making anyone else sick
(not to mention the potential legal liability if the food is being
sold), so if they're being served to anyone else then they should be
kept either above 140 degrees F or below 40 degrees F until serving
(standard food service safety).

- Doc


--
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
  Edouard Halidai  (Daniel Myers)
  http://www.medievalcookery.com/
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-