Okay you bring out your steaks and hamburger patties on a platter out to the bbq grill. You lay you meat out and grill to various levels of doneness, but in any case you are satisfied that you’ve killed off any harmful bacteria.
You then return the meat to the original platter which has been rinsed off, but not sterilized.
Are you safe from food poisoning ?
No. There could still be bacteria on the plate, since it was merely “rinsed off.” And even though the exterior of the meat you took off the grill is hot and will kill a good number of bacteria it comes into contact with, it can’t kill all of them, or even as many as a good wash with soap and water (well, soap and water washes off as many (more?) than it kills, but you get my point.)
Now, the question becomes how unsafe are you? In my mind, not that un-safe…I still wouldn’t do it, but it would probably take many dozens of times before the chance for food poisoning became statistically significant. Not only would there be a relatively small amount of bacteria, but odds are you’re going to eat the meat pretty quick so they won’t have much time to breed and produce toxins (IIRC most bacterium are killed in the stomach…it’s usually their toxic byproducts from all that hot, sweaty bacteria-lovin’ that make you sick. If they die before they have time to breed, you’re probably ok.)
Safe? Define safe. There’s a certain likelihood that you’ll get sick. IMHO, whipping out my microbiology degree, I wouldn’t sweat it too much if you’re at home, serving a few people. If you’re in a restaurant, serving dozens or hundreds a day, and you’re doing this on a regular basis, I’d tell you to knock it off.
That said, even at home, how hard is it to just grab another plate?
As far as killing microbes on the meat itself, your couple minutes on the grill will do a fair job on the steaks–and will be useless with the hamburger patties, since they’ve already had surface bacteria incorporated into their centers. You’d have to cook them through, to be safe.
And no, just rinsing off the original platter won’t get rid of bacteria on it. They’re sticky little buggers. Removing them requires a surfactant and physical force.
using different containers/platters and utensils for raw and cooked meat is the safe thing to do. if you can’t get a different set of hands then you should wash the ones you have, use a different towel to dry then you used after washing when handling raw (that towel should be quarantined). that from a food safety perspective, people has done less for centuries though.
You are not as safe as you could be. The focus is on the hamburger patties. That is food that has been handled, and IF it contains something along the lines of e-coli, it’d be nice if it was cooked properly and landed on a dish after cooking that was cleaned properly (which probably goes beyond just a rinse.
The steaks aren’t much of an issue.
The most likely things to happen are from chicken. I believe the odds of facing salmonella are much much more likely. Salmonella exists in chicken, it does not have to be handled improperly to find its way into the chicken. For ground beef, mishandling is required.
Chicken: I’d say the odds are best that the food or plate is contaminated and risks are highest for food poisoning.
Ground beef/patties: Lower than chicken for risk, but chance that it contains e-coli. Although e-coli is more dangerous than salmonella (isn’t it?)
Steaks: Not much of a concern here.
I do the rinse thing all the time, and although I’m aware that there’s a possibility of getting sick it hasn’t ever happened to me.
I take the raw meat out, to the BBQ, on a stack of two plates, removing the top one, once everything is on the grill.
I also keep a small stack of cheap facecloths, in my kitchen drawer, and pull one out whenever I am handling raw meat. I wipe my hands on that, and then into the wash it goes. I don’t have to worry about the dishtowels or anyone getting sick.
It’s about habits, really. Once you get it, you never have to give such things another thought.
It always makes me uncomfortable, when I witness someone do as you’ve described. You only need to experience food poisoning once to understand the risk.
My brother does this all the time, except he doesn’t rinse the platter, or even dump out the juice before returning the steaks to it. I revert to strict vegetarianism whenever I visit his house.
Sanitized with bleach would be overboard, but a simple rinse wouldn’t be enough. A washing with hot water and soap would be just right, and takes only 5 seconds more than the rinse.
It’s what I generally do at home. Transport to grill, return to wash, transport cooked product all on the same plate/tray.
Does the hot water part of that equation really matter? I’ve always wondered. . .
Hot water helps rinse away soap and/or fat. Cold water makes fats congeal, making them much harder to remove.
I wouldn’t do it. You’re probably not going to get sick from it, but it doesn’t fit food handling safety guidelines (and I do try to follow those, and I am trained in microbiology).