re: Pot of red beans on stove overnight

quote:

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What about the notion that there is very little chance that such bacteria could get into a closed pot enough to cause a problem during the timeframe I'm dealing with here?

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We’re talking about microbes here. They are very good at getting themselves wherever they want to be.

Just to play Devil’s advocate, let’s say there was some bacteria present on the underside lid of your pot. You shut off your fire and covered it, the steam condensed into water droplets and they fall back into your beans carrying the bacteria with them. The beans are now 110* which is like a jacuzzi at the playboy mansion for Bacteria.

Your kid’s immune system is a little suppressed this week cause it’s fighting off the staphylococcus germs from their classmate sneezing on them.

Maybe they just get a little diarrhea and you’ll say “oh... tommy’s got a stomach bug”

Or in the case of Ecoli, maybe they become a paraplegic

Or in the case of botchulism, maybe something worse

Look, we’re all just a few generations from people who grew up during the Great Depression, so the notion of wasting food being a mortal sin has been beaten into all of us. Like I said before, there’s a good chance you’ll be fine. But there’s a small chance you won’t. All depends on your risk tolerance. I’m probably more paranoid than I need to be because of my background. Hell, when I went to culinary school they showed us a video of a poor bastard who was a cook at a diner. He stored sautéed onions on the side of his griddle not under refrigeration. They ended up being contaminated with botchulism and he killed like 30 people.