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Odd issue getting out of the Danger Zone

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84Tigers

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Greetings all. New to the forum as a poster, but I have been a reader / lurker for years :) Been smoking since 2011, so while I am new to the forum, I am (somewhat) experienced in smoked pork butt and brisket.

I would like to tap the collective intelligence of the forum for a problem I had a couple weeks ago. My old electric Masterbuilt had just died, so I bought a Pit-Boss vertical pellet smoker. On this new unit I placed two bone-in pork butts (injected with apple juice) on the top shelf. Each was about 9-to-10 pounds. Started smoking them at 11 PM Friday, set at 225 degrees. When I woke up at 6 am I inserted a temp probe into each. One was 155 (where it should be at that point in the smoke) and the other was 133. Of course, I inserted another temp probe into the under-cooked one and it also read 133. Crap! For food safety reasons (way too long in the danger zone) I **reluctantly** decided to pitch the under-cooked one. The only difference between the two was I placed a pan of apple juice mixed with some rub about 12 inches beneath the one that was under-cooked. It would be my guess that the pan somehow acted as a heat shield for the under-cooked butt. However, I have done this before in my old Masterbuilt without any problems (I use the pan to catch more of the drippings, which I would later add in the serving dish to help keep the meat moist).

Does my assessment make sense about the heat shield causing the issue? All feedback is appreciated. Thank you!

Todd
 
Maybe the cooker has a cool spot and the spot where you put that butt was the highway to the danger zone.
 
Thanks for the reply, Chipper. I was wondering about that too. The entire unit is like an enclosed oven with a smoke vent, so I don't know how it could have any "cool spots", but I guess it is possible.
 
I am sure that all smokers, regardless of fuel source, have different temp zones within. One quick and easy test is a biscuit test where you get one or two cans of biscuits and place them throughout the smoker and check to see which get done the quickest. It's cheaper than losing another butt. Good luck with it.
 
I know rules are rules, and the 140° is the "rule", but one school of thought is that with whole muscle meat, the surface is where most of the baddies live. If your internal was 133° the surface would have been higher. Now, how fast the surface took to get to 140° is anyone's guess.... so you made a safe call.

Did you happen to take a second temp on the 155° butt to make sure the 155° was not a false positive, like maybe you were in a fat pocket?

And regarding the 155° but, it took 7 hours to get there... how much longer did you cook it to get the tenderness you wanted?

Or like you thought maybe the pan was a heat sink or
 
Yeah I can't help with the temp issue but you were probably fine. 133 inside means the bad bugs outside were dead.
 
Do a biscuit test in your cooker and see the hot and cool spots for yourself.

Then you’ll know, if the biscuits don’t show a cold spot on the under cooked side you’ll know it was more than likely the pan all things being equal.
 
I have the same smoker and did 2 butts in it about 3 weeks ago, put them on at a similar time but had them down a little from where the top rack would normally be. I ran it at 225 also but I always put my Smoke in there to monitor temps especially on an overnight cook, it's nice to have a high and low alarm set so I can sleep better, anyway I found that 225 has huge temp swings up and down, I think I had my alarms set for 50* high and low of 225, they went off so often that I finally just set it at 250* and it was much more stable.
Anyway I never put any liquid in any pans in the smoker, I take the butts to 170-180 then put them in a pan, cover with foil, finish in the oven, defat the juice and add it all back once pulled.
But yeah that pan could have been a heat sink and I would check to see how that thing runs when set at 225* cuz mine is all over the place and I've heard from others that at 225* theirs has huge temp swings also.
Sucks you had to chuck one. :cry:
 
The danger zone ends at 129 and the window is quite a bit longer than 4 hours, but odd numbers are “hard” to remember so the 40-140-4 hours BS was born.
 
If I recall correctly, the danger zone applies to leaving food out in that temp range and not about cooking through it. There’s no rule that you have to power through 140F before a certain amount of time. Look at sous vide cooking...

Having said that, I’ve done a few briskets that took 12-16 hours around 225 and it certainly lingered before 140F for a few hours without any problems.
 
As pointed out this was essentially the same as a sous vide cook and 133 (and rising) for hours is more than enough to kill the beasts I get it - better safe than kneeling to the porcelain gods. That said - you acted with due caution and will now have to figure out 'why'.
 
Czarbecue said:
If I recall correctly, the danger zone applies to leaving food out in that temp range and not about cooking through it. There’s no rule that you have to power through 140F before a certain amount of time. Look at sous vide cooking...

Having said that, I’ve done a few briskets that took 12-16 hours around 225 and it certainly lingered before 140F for a few hours without any problems.
Click to expand...

It can apply to both situations. A good example of the cooking side of the danger zone is smoking sausage or summer sausage in large diameter casings, but using low pit temps. Ground meat is riskier for bacteria than whole muscle meat so spending 5 or 6 hours in a lower temp smoker is not a good idea. But, if you add curing salts into the sausage you can extend the 4 hour window. And with curing salts you don't have to take the sausage internal to 160°, you can pull it at 152°.
 
Maybe I'm stating the obvious, but doesn't every piece of meat cook differently? Also, if you were wrapping after that, I think the temps might come closer in the wrap. You might have to keep one in the a bit longer, but not that much longer.
 
Thanks all for the helpful feedback and insights. So, I didn’t have any biscuits, but I have several digital thermometers. I placed two near the bottom — one to the left and right — and two near the top — one to the left and right. I was really surprised! It seems the one to the top right (if you’re facing the unit) consistently ran 15 to 20° cooler than the others. I ran the smoker for at least two hours and it was consistently in this range below the other thermometers’ readings. I wouldn’t think there’d be that much temperature differentiation, but there was. The under cooked butt sat in the upper right, so whatever temperature I had it sent at, it would’ve been running 15 to 20° cooler. In addition, I didn’t do the temperature test with a pan underneath it, but I would expect at least a few degrees of heat would probably be reduced due to the pan. I guess it’s fair to assume the smoker set at 225 would’ve had the actual heat around the butt closer to 200 with the pan underneath it. Learn something new every time I smoke.

BTW: if anyone has a link to food safety standards that state the lower top-end of the danger zone is closer to 129°, please share the link! I emailed the USDA “Food Safety and Inspection Service” people and they stated the 4 hour - 140° danger zone was a strict rule, even for smoking at lower temperatures like 225° and even if the meat was or was not injected / pierced. Anything that doesn’t hit that mark is potentially very dangerous according to them. But if someone has another source for something different I’d really like to review it.

Thanks again,
Todd
 
Highway to the danger zone
Right into the danger zone
Highway to the danger zone
Gonna take you right into the danger zone
Highway to the danger zone
Right into the danger zone
Highway to the danger zone
Gonna take you right into the danger zone
Highway to the danger zone
Right into the danger zone
 
84Tigers said:
Thanks all for the helpful feedback and insights. So, I didn’t have any biscuits, but I have several digital thermometers. I placed two near the bottom — one to the left and right — and two near the top — one to the left and right. I was really surprised! It seems the one to the top right (if you’re facing the unit) consistently ran 15 to 20° cooler than the others. I ran the smoker for at least two hours and it was consistently in this range below the other thermometers’ readings. I wouldn’t think there’d be that much temperature differentiation, but there was. The under cooked butt sat in the upper right, so whatever temperature I had it sent at, it would’ve been running 15 to 20° cooler. In addition, I didn’t do the temperature test with a pan underneath it, but I would expect at least a few degrees of heat would probably be reduced due to the pan. I guess it’s fair to assume the smoker set at 225 would’ve had the actual heat around the butt closer to 200 with the pan underneath it. Learn something new every time I smoke.

BTW: if anyone has a link to food safety standards that state the lower top-end of the danger zone is closer to 129°, please share the link! I emailed the USDA “Food Safety and Inspection Service” people and they stated the 4 hour - 140° danger zone was a strict rule, even for smoking at lower temperatures like 225° and even if the meat was or was not injected / pierced. Anything that doesn’t hit that mark is potentially very dangerous according to them. But if someone has another source for something different I’d really like to review it.

Thanks again,
Todd
Click to expand...

If you are cooking commercially you need to follow regulations. If it if for home, following actual science is allowable.

http://www.foodprotect.org/issues/packets/2012packet/attachments/iii_018__all.pdf

Bacteria is dying, not expanding by 129 but it takes impractically long to sterilize at that temp. As the temp increases it dies faster until you get to near instant at 160 ish.
 
m-fine said:
If you are cooking commercially you need to follow regulations. If it if for home, following actual science is allowable.

http://www.foodprotect.org/issues/packets/2012packet/attachments/iii_018__all.pdf

Bacteria is dying, not expanding by 129 but it takes impractically long to sterilize at that temp. As the temp increases it dies faster until you get to near instant at 160 ish.
Click to expand...

I've been a public health food safety person for over a decade and I agree with this one. (I especially like the home vs. Commercial perspective, lol.)

The four hour rule is for storage more than cooking. If an item being hot held is below temp, heating it back to 160 plus is a way to salvage.

In the case of the pork butt here, i probably would not have worried much as long as the final temp was reached, assuming you were cooking to a final temp over 160.

I also agree that you could make an assumption the bacteria were on the outside and were gone by the time the internal was 130, but I try never to assume. In this case, what might the thermometers, injection, etc., have in inadvertently introduced? It's a minor risk, but still.
 
JMack: so if I have a butt that is around 130° internal temp after five hours during the beginning of the cook, if I continue and finish it off to an internal temp around 200 or 205° you would not have any concerns? I usually take them up to about that temp. I appreciate the feedback from you and everyone else on this matter as I learn more about it.

Thanks,
Todd
 
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