Huh? Was that directed at me? What rules did I quote without context? Why aren’t people going to trust my information?
I’ve been poisoned by food (oysters that were contaminated) but I’m not sure if I’ve ever had food poisoning. I probably should have, as I’m the guy who eats stuff that all the rules say I should have thrown out.
What I’ll never get is the idea that the food might be bad, so give it to the dog. What? I’d much rather suffer self-limiting vomiting and diarrhea than have to deal with my dog having the same. I’ll deposit my waste into a toilet, my dog will not.
Unless it is Kimchi, it needs to be refrigerated.
Yes, maybe i misread you, but i think the “correct advice” in this case refers to the FDA guidelines that are very blanket “don’t eat it” in a lot of cases where most Americans would eat it (like pizza left out for several hours.) And that leads to confusion. 
I think the thinking is that dogs, with their hardier digestive systems and better senses of smell, can be trusted to know what is safe for them to eat.
Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know, although I’d guess it depends on the dog.
Dogs eat stuff that makes them sick all the time. I think part of their “health system” is throwing up quickly if they eat something that unsettles their tummies.
Yep, and I’d rather be the one vomiting (into the toilet).
Same, although i don’t live with dogs, so it’s not really a choice.
I disagree, but it depends a great deal on the cut of meat and how you choose to cook it. I would venture to guess that the good results you got from your chuck roast was that you were more or less stewing it. When I prepare beef or pork from scratch, it’s usually in the form of steaks or chops that go on the grill. Thawing those in the microwave results in the loss of a lot of juices, so the cooked product tends to be dried out. In my experience, the best results are obtained from product that has never been frozen at all, but if it needs to be thawed, some combination of overnight in the fridge and/or sitting out at room temperature is far superior to microwave thawing.
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On the general subject of leaving food out at room temperature, several posters mentioned a guideline of two hours. The ones I’ve seen more often say four hours. IMHO both guidelines are completely useless because it depends on so many factors:
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What is “room temperature”? Leaving food out in a room that’s 65°F in winter is drastically different than one that’s 95°F in a non-air-conditioned house.
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What kind of food? Raw vs cooked makes a big difference. Raw fish vs smoked sausage are worlds apart.
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There’s a big difference between hot food that’s cooling down vs cold food that is warming up.
I tend to be pretty laid-back about leaving food out, and also about the paranoia about refreezing. There’s a nice shepherd’s pie I sometimes buy that is marked as “previously frozen”. I have no qualms about throwing it in the freezer and have never had a problem.
I had a pretty bad case of food poisoning only once in my life and it had nothing to do with any of those things. It happened after preparing a frozen pizza on which I had put some olives and peppers and other stuff from a dressed salad that had been sitting in the fridge for many days. I never established the exact cause – it might have been that the pizza had been thawed and spoiled at some point in the distribution process, but I think more likely that the salad ingredients with dressing on them had gone bad.
It was a really awful experience. At one point I thought I was going to pass out and thought I should call 911 for an ambulance. Fortunately it got better after a few hours. I’m still pretty casual about food safety – even about prepared salads past their best-by date, provided they don’t have dressing on them!
The important lesson from that horrible experience is that although heat kills bacteria, it does nothing at all for the toxins that the bacteria may have created.
My wife is very bad about not tossing out food that has been in the fridge too long. And by “too long”, I mean more than 3-4 days. I’m constantly finding things that have been pushed to the back of the fridge and I have become very diligent about chucking anything that is suspect. She hates food waste, but if it’s inedible because it’s been left too long, it’s a zero sum game. Food poisoning at our age can be fatal or at least result in a stint in the ER.
My mother used to leave out cooked food like fried chicken so it didn’t get soggy. I don’t remember anybody getting sick from it, but I wouldn’t do it.
Me too! I always leave frozen items on the counter to thaw. It would take a week to thaw anything in my fridge. I’ve also thawed meat and then changed my mind or didn’t have time to cook it and have thrown it back in the freezer. None of us has ever had any kind of food sickness. I’ve been doing it since I got married in 1982!
I once left out pizza overnight and it was fine for breakfast. There were no meat toppings.
And salami/pepperoni is already preserved, so I wouldn’t even worry about those.
Everyone else has already covered the food safety parts so I’ll just comment on this part.
Don’t post anything online if you don’t want it scrutinized. Especially The Dope. It’s a beloved feature of this place.