6 hours ago, rotuts said:the USDA numbers are a bit high. whole egg 60 C ?
however they want to be on the safe side so Im guessing that's the reason for the numbers
130.1 F ( a trad less than 55 C ) will pasteurize anything if you leave it ' in the bath ' long enough, then treat it appropriately
after its ' done '
I wonder what a 140 egg is like , has it begun to ' cook ? ' i.e. 60 C ?
they do say albumin @ 55.6 C is pasteurized.
its also important that the pasteurized egg does not get re-contaminated after its pasteurized :
i.e. you can't put it back in the egg carton unless its also pasteurized
The USDA guidelines are indeed high in that they are designed to achieve a level of reduction in pathogenic organisms that is sufficient to prevent foodborne illness even in vulnerable people. The target is something like a 5-log reduction in the case of egg products, meaning that the conditions in their guidelines are designed to reduce microorganisms in the product by a factor of 100,000. And it is true that above a certain minimum temperature you can achieve an equivalent log reduction by increasing the amount of time-at-temp, but it's worth pointing out that as the temp decreases, the time-at-temp required increases logarithmically. For instance, USDA recommends cooking chicken to 165F, which hits the reduction target in a matter of seconds. You can achieve the same reduction at 136F, but that would take over an hour.
Finally, a whole egg at 140F will just begin to see some protein coagulation. Ovotransferrin, a protein component that makes up 12% of the white, will start to coagulate at 140F. Ovalbumin, which comprises 54% of the white, starts to coagulate at 180F. Yolk proteins don't start to coagulate until right around 149F (65C), so pasteurizing at 63.3C should not result in any appreciable thickening.
