Chicken Cooking Temperatures and Scalding the Cavity

[rane008]

Hi All,

I've been thinking about this for some time. In James Peterson's book Cooking, he claims that the ideal temperature for roasting chicken is 145F. Now, I know that the USDA claims it should be cooked to 160F, but I find that dry and rather over-protective. From what I understand, e. Coli and the botulism bacteria are killed at 137F, and removing the bird at 145F will result in a 155F internal temp after 10 minutes of rest, basically clearing out all the bad stuff. I've tried this several times and been very happy (and healthy) with the results. (Do you guys have thoughts on "optimal" interior temp, realizing that it is also a matter of taste?)

However, I have heard that the cavity is the last place to achieve the desired temperature. I am not sure if this is true, but it does lend to a bigger question, that of stuffing. i hardly ever stuff a bird, because by the time the stuffing reaches the safe temp, the bird is overcooked. So I was thinking, could you scald the interior cavity of the bird with boiling water to kill anything inside it, then run a cold bath to prevent further cooking? Also, couldn't the bird be stuffed with hot stuffing, which may accomplish the same thing?

Cheers,

Stephen

[Chris Hennes]

Lots of questions here: the food science stuff has been pretty well documented by Modernist Cuisine, so if you can get your hands on Volume 1 of that series it will help you understand the relationships between time and temperature with respect to killing bacteria (you are looking for information on the "thermal death curve" for those pathogens). I like white meat at 140°F and dark at 160°F, personally, but have given up completely on trying to achieve this through roasting a whole bird, so rarely cook them that way. That said, scalding the interior cavity and stuffing with already-hot stuffing does sound like a good path to safe stuffing.

[rane008]

I will one day own that set of books. That day is not today.