this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2024
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Weird News - Things that make you go 'hmmm'

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The bacteria is best known for causing a type of food poisoning called "Fried Rice Syndrome," since rice is sometimes cooked and left to cool at room temperature for a few hours. During that time, the bacteria can contaminate it and grow. B. cereus is especially dangerous because it produces a toxin in rice and other starchy foods that is heat resistant and may not die when the food it infects is cooked.

And

Unfortunately, that was the case for a 20-year-old student, who passed away after eating five-day-old pasta.

His story was described in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology a few years back, but has since resurfaced due to some YouTube videos and Reddit posts. According to article, every Sunday the student would make his meals for the entire week so he wouldn't need to deal with making it on the weekdays. One Sunday, he cooked up some spaghetti, then put it in Tupperware containers so that days later, he could just add some sauce to it, reheat it and enjoy it.

However, he didn't store the pasta in the fridge, rather he left it out on the counter. After five days of the food sitting out at room temperature, he heated some up and ate it. While he noticed an odd taste to the food, he figured it was just due to the new tomato sauce he added to it.

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[–] [email protected] 401 points 1 month ago (16 children)

This made me really anxious about how long I tend to leave food out up until the moment I read that he left it out on the counter FOR FIVE DAYS

[–] [email protected] 104 points 1 month ago

Same lol. 5 days is absolutely insane.

[–] [email protected] 70 points 1 month ago (15 children)

I lived with a flatmate that used to pull this sort of shit.

Typical process:

She would remove the frozen chicken from the fridge, put it on the outdoor table, then go to class. Would come home to a defrosted chicken, which she would take and chop in half on the kitchen floor. Then she would put one half back in the freezer, usually on top. Lovely going to get ice to find it's covered in frozen defrosted chicken blood. She would then use the other half to cook up a soup in our one big pot we had. This pot would live on the back corner of the stove for a week. Or two. Each day she would take a ladle full and warm it up to eat. The big pot wasn't kept warm or in the fridge.

I got to the point where as soon as we saw the mould growing out of the pot, we would biff the entire contents and water blast the pot outside. Much to her annoyance.

She would then just repeat again the next week.

[–] [email protected] 46 points 1 month ago (1 children)

what the fuck??? how did you not pull her aside and say "hey, not ok"??

[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Oh we did.

Regularly.

But as poor students, it was pick your battles. Her dick boyfriend used to drive them both home drunk as, then cook chicken nuggets at 3am setting off the smoke alarms on a Tuesday...

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago (2 children)

My MIL does this, to this day, regularly, and it baffles me how she doesn't get food poisoning.

She most recently let a chicken carcass hang out at room temp for 36 hours before boiling it to make a soup, which, okay, boil it long and high enough you're probably fine. But then after it was done the stove was turned off and it sat out for another 18 hours before being put in the fridge.

Also she doesn't believe that hard boiled eggs need to be refrigerated, I've seen a batch sit for 7+ days.

She also thinks I'm wasteful if I toss something that's moldy, she scrapes the mold off and eats it. But based on what I've read, there are unseen spores you're just ingesting so screw that.

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 month ago

Kitchen floor you say??

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago

When's the funeral?

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago (6 children)

It was a bit of an anxiety ride for me as well, being a frequent rice and pasta consumer.

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The CDC says no more than two hours for perishable food, and one hour if ambient temp is 90°F or above.

[–] Honytawk 54 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (9 children)

For the 96% of the world that aren't stuck in the 1700, that means 32°C

[–] [email protected] 66 points 1 month ago

Save someone else having to look up the conversion: 1700 metric years is roughly 3092 years fahrenheit

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (9 children)

Never fails to amaze me how so many people don't understand basic food storage.

My clients, constantly: "What do you mean I can't just throw this open bag in the fridge?", "What do you mean, 'foil isn't airtight'?", "I don't know how long it's been in there! What do you mean it expired a month ago?" and my absolute favorite, "You can't throw my moldy food away! You owe me money for that!"

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Are you a fridge-contents-consultant or something?

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[–] [email protected] 116 points 1 month ago (5 children)

5 days out of the fridge - even sealed - is straight insanity. Of course he got sick eventually, I'm just surprised it took so long 😱😱😱

[–] [email protected] 67 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm surprised it wasn't visibly mouldy at that point

[–] [email protected] 40 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

The article says he stored it in Tupperware. Spaghetti in an airtight container, like rice and other carbs, take a lot longer to show signs of mold. So maybe not in the first week. But absolutely after a month!

And for anybody curious who wants to try the science: reminder that if you see visible mold, it's already too late. The spores are deep in the food and what's visible is just a fraction of the fungus!

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[–] [email protected] 103 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Honestly 5 days out on the counter was asking for trouble - that long is tempting fate even when stored properly in the fridge

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Yeah, cooked pasta? Two days tops, and I personally wouldn’t touch it after one. And why not refrigerate it? Did they not own one, because I can’t see any other logical explanation to not do this.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Two days on pasta? I give 5-7 in the fridge, and six months if I freeze it. Maybe a little less if its a dairy based sauce like alfredo

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[–] [email protected] 93 points 1 month ago (13 children)

I just realised ... The bacteria is ... Seriously ... Called B. Cereus?

[–] [email protected] 62 points 1 month ago

I am serious, and don't call me bacteria.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 month ago (2 children)

The specific name, cereus, meaning "waxy" in Latin, refers to the appearance of colonies grown on blood agar.

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[–] [email protected] 86 points 1 month ago (1 children)

5 days ON THE COUNTER?! And it tasted off, and he consumed it anyway.

This is so stupid that it has to be intentional suicide.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

I one time argued with literally hundreds of people on Reddit about basic food safety regarding food left out on the counter. I'm still floored by it. Numerous government agencies around the world agree about this, and yet...

Btw food safety was MORE critical before modern science because you could easily die from it back then. That was a common excuse people gave me in the previously mentioned subreddit, for eating food left out/bad - "our ancestors did it". No.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Dude, I grew up with nonstop food poisoning because my mom did this. My family always said it was a "stomach flu" when the whole family was puking and shitting every other week.

It was horrible and I think it did some damage to my digestive system long term. I didn't figure it out until I was in my 20's and stopped eating anything she cooked.

I'm weird about left overs now, even though my husband is very clean when he cooks and doesn't leave food out, or if he does it goes in the trash.

Don't leave your food out people. It will fuck you up one day.

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[–] [email protected] 75 points 1 month ago (5 children)

This is such a fuckin non story. Dude left cooked food out unrefridgerated and got sick and died. No fuckin shit. We have places to keep cooked food cold for a fuckin reason. Stupid ass article trying to scare people about fuckin leftovers. Fuck this piece of shit ass article and the twat that wrote it.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago (7 children)

I genuinely know of an individual who believes refrigeration is a hoax and a conspiracy. He refrigerates nothing. Milk in the cabinets. I guess it's just big refrigerator trying to manipulate us?

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[–] [email protected] 55 points 1 month ago (14 children)

5 days without putting it into the fridge? That's asking for trouble.

I feel comfortable about 2-4 hours without a fridge, but I've occasionally left rice out 12 hours a few times with no issues. Same with pasta.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago (7 children)

4 hours max in the zone between 40 and 140F is the general guideline for risk. There are a lot of nuances to it like how pasteurization and sous vide cooking work but in general that’s a good rule of thumb

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[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 month ago (1 children)

5 days without putting it in the fridge? Hell at 5 days I'd even freeze it.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 month ago (4 children)

I was doing something similar and even in the fridge at day 5 I could taste that it was borderline ok. At 5 days on the counter it must have tasted so fermented it was bubbling.

Pasta and kimchi all in one.

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[–] [email protected] 48 points 1 month ago

It’s almost like the scientists who named this bacteria knew this would happen.

You can’t… B. Cereus

[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

One Sunday, he cooked up some spaghetti, then put it in Tupperware containers so that days later, he could just add some sauce to it, reheat it and enjoy it.

Five day old spaghetti sitting on a warm counter? Eww.

I thought he made a pasta dish, and the kept eating that. What the hell, making the spaghetti is the easiest bit and barely take a longer than microwaving some disgusting old pasta.

RIP this guy but I feel like we didn't necessarily lose one of our sharpest minds.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

I found out about this case through the chubbyemu video. Not sure how much of this was embellishment, but the way it's explained in the video is that the pasta was left out for a couple days, then thrown into the refrigerator by a roommate who didn't know it was probably bad. The guy then took out a portion of the pasta, completely unaware that it had gone rancid. Definitely a more believable mistake (although still pretty irresponsible of the meal prepper).

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Misleading title. He didn't eat leftovers. He was eating rancid, spoiled food that had been left out for 5 days. He was eating garbage.

Leftovers are when you store food in the fridge for a few days in a container.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 month ago (5 children)

Terrible headline. The bacteria that killed him is associated with ‘Fried Rice Syndrome’ but FRS is named for leftovers stored in the fridge, not uneaten food left on the counter.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 month ago (4 children)

This thread is interesting. Everywhere ranging from "I eat pizza from the counter after 3 days" to "yeah I would never eat anything left out on the counter for over 2 hours".

And someone said everything in their fridge is food they cooked over 5 days ago.... Why??

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 month ago (9 children)

And someone said everything in their fridge is food they cooked over 5 days ago…

I've been doing this for years and years. Maybe not wayyy more than 5 days but it is usually about a week. I don't have all that much time after work so I don't want to waste time cooking and I'm not wasting money on take out so I do all my cooking for the week on Saturday or Sunday. I don't do what the poor kid in the article did though, if anything I put things in the fridge that are still way too hot but I never wanted to risk something like that.

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago (6 children)

Shoot I'll leave rice on the counter all day sometimes... I should stop doing that.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (4 children)

Again?!

Edit: oops no. Same guy. I think about this all the time. Like...who raised him to leave pasta on the counter and then eat it?! The sheer ignorance baffles me.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 month ago (11 children)

Im astounded at the speed that this can kill.

If I’m reading the article correctly, it was <24 hrs? God damn.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (2 children)
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[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 month ago (12 children)

5 days??? Yikes. I feel uncomfortable if I leave food out for an hour just to let it cool down. I'll admit I've done some stupid stuff with leaving food out in my younger years (pizza left in the box on the counter for 2-3 days; one time while deployed to Iraq I stupidly thought the floor of our trailer would remain cool enough to keep an open can of chip dip fresh -- Newsflash: It did not), but 5 days??

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 month ago (2 children)

The bacteria is best known for causing a type of food poisoning called "Fried Rice Syndrome," since rice is sometimes cooked and left to cool at room temperature for a few hours.

left to cool at room temperature for a few hours

I think I do that almost every single time I make food

[–] [email protected] 52 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

Guy that died let it sit out for multiple days per article... he was eating rotting food.

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (2 children)

However, he didn’t store the pasta in the fridge, rather he left it out on the counter.

Oh, okay. And I was worried for a moment that it could happen to me...

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