Cooked ,refrigrerated chicken grew mold under 24 hours?!
Cooked ,refrigrerated chicken grew mold under 24 hours?
We cooked fresh chicken breast with artichokes and mushrooms. Then refrigerated it that was about noon. The next morning the tin foil on top of the chicken was pitted and the chicken had grown mold overnite. We threw it out. Any clues as to why this happened ? Thanks
Answers: Check the temperature of the refrigerator - probably not cool enough. Probably had more to do with the mushrooms than the chicken....did they smell fresh when you were cooking them? Maybe the chicken wasn't as fresh as you thought, but still 24 hours is very fast for mould. So, the other possibility is that something else in your fridge is giving off mould spores. Time for a good clean out and thorough disinfecting, I would guess. i think it was rotten Listeria perhaps.
Listeria are bacteria that can cause a serious illness called listeriosis in some people. While Listeria infection is uncommon and causes few or no symptoms in healthy people, it can be very dangerous for those people at risk.
Listeriosis is usually caused by eating food contaminated by certain types of Listeria bacteria. The Listeria bacteria are found widely in nature. Storing contaminated foods, even in the refrigerator, may allow the Listeria bacteria to grow.
If you plan to eat previously cooked and refrigerated leftovers, only keep them in the refrigerator for a day and reheat them thoroughly to steaming hot. This will kill Listeria bacteria.
Fridge has to be at least 40 °F or it won't stop bacteria.
As chicken goes bad, it smells. Smell the chicken when you put it in the fridge. It should smell about the same when you take it out again to serve it. The foil was pitted? I've never heard of that and I'm a qualified chef. The chicken could not possibly have grown mould overnight. That's simply impossible. I don't know what the answer is, but I have accidentally left cooked chicken out of the refrigerator on the kitchen counter overnight, and it didn't mold that quickly. It couldn't have been that your refrigerator wasn't cold enough. It had to be something with the pitting of the foil because I have never heard of that. I really don't have a clue. But I would suggest that you thoroughly clean your refrigerator. In hope to clean and make sure that doesn't happen again. Also place a small thermometer in the fridge to make sure your temperature is cold enough. if the chicken dish had anything acidic in it it could cause the pitting and discoloration. This would occur within 8 to 10 hours. The chicken would have to be in direct contact with the foil. The reaction could have been from the artichokes, or what was in the sauce. i.e white wine, lemon juice etc. chemical reaction with aluminum foil use either plastic wrap or tupperware [ rice and foil will do similar], suspect physical contact with artichokes then [bleeding] into mushrooms .