My mother recently brought home some hamburgers and upon the routine “checking the meat” she found a minimal amount of pinkness in some areas… Of course, being the paranoid individual she is, she immediately declares the burgers will make us sick and that she must take them back for well done ones… I don’t like my burgers bloody, but a little bit of pinkness doesn’t bother me, my point is, is there any sites to reference which clearly declare her opinion that any pinkness in burger meat WILL make you sick, wrong?
Rare burgers are (in theory) less safe than rare steaks; with most whole cuts of meat, the majority of pathogens are on the outer surface and cooking destroys them. Burgers are made from meat ground up in the raw state - any pathogens on the outside surfaces get evenly mixed through the whole thing and may not be destroyed if the middle doesn’t get hot enough.
Should cook to 160*F - to be “safe”
Don’t know if that will eliminate all pinkness, but any well done beef is NOT as good.
Can’t stand it when I go out and some chump at the table orders a well done burger. The cook always seems to cook them all to the same level, and I get stuck with a dry no flavor disc.
Pinkness in the burger increases the chance that it MIGHT make you sick. I don’t believe there’s a certainty that well-done burgers CAN’T make you sick, though of course the probability is lessened.
I routinely eat pink burgers and to my knowledge have never gotten sick from it.
I have eaten pink, red, and even cold red burgers (parts of frozen ones too) with never any problem. The problem (IMHO) is very minor and very unlikely or just for people without iron guts.
No, because, as a matter of fact, Brandon, your mom is 100% spot on. Yes, she’s right again–dang. And what’s worse, the entire Internet–all 3,083,324,652 web pages of it–is on her side.
Jeepers, dude, don’t you listen to the news? 
The whole deal with the E.coli outbreaks and all the ground beef recalls is that for all practical purposes the American consumer has to consider that the American ground beef supply is formally, permanently, susceptible to E.coli contamination, and that all (ALL) ground beef should always be cooked to “well done”, with no pinkness.
CDC page for you, now that you’ve evidently clambered out of your mine shaft and rejoined Civilization.
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/escherichiacoli_g.htm
**All Hail to the Ever-Vigilant Mom. I’d have done the same thing, plus I’d have given the restaurant manager holy hell for undercooking their burgers.
To recap–bloody diarrhea, kidney failure in 2% to 7% of cases, and, sometimes, death.
Recalls.
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/OA/recalls/prelease/pr055-2002.htm
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/OA/recalls/prelease/pr086-2002.htm
And these are only a couple of the hits from the USDA on “ground beef recalls”.
CNN.com is the same way. Recall after recall.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/07/19/meat.recall/
http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/Midwest/09/27/ecoli.recall.ap/
There was another one just the other day.
http://www.themonroetimes.com/o1108bee.htm
So the Straight Dope is, you have to assume that all ground beef is contaminated, and cook it “well done”. And no, this is not “paranoid”, just “better safe than sorry”. It’s like putting a battery in the smoke detector. You may never need it, but, boy, that one time you need it, you really need it.
One solution is to ensure that beef is handled properly, instead of forcing us to eat overcooked food.
I for one can’t wait until irradiated meat hits the market. Then I can have my steak sashimi without too much fuss.
Unfortunately, any amount of proper handling can only reduce the risk to a certain point; fact is that animals are full of (and often covered with) shit; cutting them into pieces will always carry a risk of contamination by fecal bacteria (you can’t see 'em).
I suppose we could insist that all cuts of meat are immersed in bleach before grinding them, that might do it.
If I want to eat bloody meat (and sometimes I do), I’ll get a steak, if I eat ground meat, I’ll expect to see it fully cooked (but not overcooked; there’s no need for it to be dried out).
You can get a nice medium-rare burger at Lick’s without worry…they pasteurize the beef before it is ground…
Now that’s a good idea and would amply qualify as ‘proper handling’
The temp is the critical factor. The color of meat is due to other factors than just cooking, so your mum is getting a false sense of security.
The USDA says
They should add a <knocking on wood> after the “we’ve never had a bacterial problem”.
It does sound like a process that more establishments should look into though.