Food safety question

[jill5676]

A (possibly silly) question re food safety and freezing... We cooked our turkey Christmas day and then I made the leftovers into a pie filling, so I reheated all the leftover turkey on the hob with the chicken stock and cream. Ended up having too much filling for my pie dish so I have frozen the excess for another day but now wondering if it's unsafe to reheat it again? As I say, possibly a silly question but I'll be feeding it to a toddler so I'd rather be safe than sorry!

Yes, it would be unsafe to reheat it again. You’ve cooked the turkey once, you reheated it again to make your pie filling; you shouldn’t then reheat it a second time. Sorry. Others will be far more gung ho. I have Level 3 Food Safety and Hygiene for Supervisors, so I’m not talking out of my hat.

@Daisydoesnt thank you - you've confirmed my suspicions! A shame to waste it but never mind. I'll know for next time to make less!

It’s really annoying isn’t it! Sorry

I would reheat and eat it with no issues as long as it's reheated until piping hot

Can I ask why? Surely either it's got dodgy bacteria on it or it hasn't? Why is it ok to reheat like twice but not three times?

Sorry if I'm being an idiot.

I do this all the time and it wouldn’t occur to me to go eat it

I personally wouldn't reheat it more than once, and I would always be more cautious with younger children too.

Generally I would use it again but I would know I had kept the original leftovers extremely cold in the fridge and again the spare pie mix would have been cooled quickly and frozen. I know rules say it shouldnt but I would have no issue doing this for my own use but as I say I know the storage, I have a separate fridge that is not being opened multiple times a day to take out the milk etc and I keep all the leftover meat in that, it was so cold it froze my lettuce unfortunately!

Piping hot obviously for the reheat. Looking forward to my leftovers pie tomorrow!

Every time you bring meat up to heat and then re-cool it, bacteria is able to multiply as it passes through that “danger zone” temperature which is 5-60 degrees. During that time, some bacteria can release toxins; toxins are not killed by heat, so it doesn’t matter if you “nuke” them, so to speak.

Of course there will be loads and loads of anecdotal evidence of people who have reheated and reheated meat and been safe. That’s great. Would I do it and risk food poisoning? No way. For, what, one dinner?!