# Cooling joints of meat.



## jthaccp (Feb 1, 2003)

Hi friends,

What's the best way to rapidly cool large joints of meat and birds?
(Situation being that you want to produce your own cold meats for salads etc...)

Some chefs put them in the back yard, by an open window, leave at ambient temperature till stops steaming then into the fridge or coldroom, some put into deep freeze, some cook in sealed bags and leave in running water to cool. 

I understand that the recommended cold temperature is about 8C and this needs to be achieved as soon as possible. Some suggest this should be within 90 minutes of finishing cooking. Some mess around with temperature probes and even run the risk of introducing contamination by doing this. But try and cool a large gammon and it takes about 14 hours?!

Any suggestions? (Apart form buying the meat ready cooked!)

Best wishes.

Jerry


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## mike (Jan 24, 2003)

straight into the coldest part of an empty fridge & leave it. Ideal temp is 1 to 5 centigrade. If slicing later cut larger joints down for more rapid cooling. Birds other than turkey should cool pretty quick.
regards


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## suzanne (May 26, 2001)

You can speed the cooling by setting the (clean) pan containing the joint on top of a bed of ice in a larger pan. Turn the joint from time to time so that different sides of it are close to the ice. Make sure that the melting ice does not get into the meat pan. As already mentioned, the whole arrangement should be placed in the coldest part of the fridge, so long as nothing else will drip onto it, and it won't drip onto anything else.


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## leo r. (Nov 10, 2001)

Jerry,here`s a little reminder,food poisoning bacteria thrives in temperatures between 5-63c.The method Suzanne suggested is the most efficient to use apart from using a blast-chiller.


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