Why Can’t l Reheat My Chicken?

Food & Drink Food & Drink: Chat / Discussions
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Last week from M&S, l bought a fresh half a chicken in a foil roasting tin. I thought, with lots of vegetables, it would make me a dinner for two days. So l cooked it all and had a lovely dinner. yesterday.
Today, my plan was to cook some more vegetables and have the same meal again.
Unfortunately, the pack states, not to reheat the chicken. I have done this before using the left over chicken for a curry, or a pie after cooking a whole chicken from a cellophane bag.

I am not sure why this half chicken is any different, other than it came in a foil roasting tin?
It also stated, Not suitable for freezing.

Does anyone know why, as l don’t want to die just yet!!

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Perhaps that advice is given because the seller has no control over how it’s cooked in the first instance. Chicken carries a whole host of disease causing bacteria and I expect they are covering themselves in case of an after sales claim against them.

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LD, Now you tell me! Maybe l should just have cheese and crackers for dinner!!

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Cook it well and you should not suffer any stomach complaints. I have nuked ours since the microwave was first introduced. That cooks from the inside out, so thoroughly kills any nasties :ok_hand::+1:

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My guess is that M & S are simply doing an over the top H & S opt out, to avoid legal action when someone does not reheat it properly.

Food should not be reheated or refrozen, more than once, as doing so increases the risk of food poisoning. But it can be reheated once. Even higher risk food, such as chicken. But reheated chicken needs to be consumed ASAP after cooking & not be kept for later.

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Just out of curiosity if it were me I’d get an email sent off to M&S asking them the reason why.

Personally I always re-heat chicken & have never had any bad effects.

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You can reheat chicken soup can’t you? I don’t eat chicken now, but when I did, I heated it up again.

Not dead yet :+1:

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Yes. My Nan used to boil it until half the liquid had evaporated to make a thick broth. She reckoned it would cure almost any ailment :wink:

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We have just done it, excellent it was too. Left overs tomorrow. Been doing so for decades. I think I am still among the living.

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Jewish Penicillin ! :smiley_cat: :smiley_cat: :smiley_cat:

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Hi

Art, it is not because of you, it is because of modern food production techniques.

One infected chicken can have the bugs spread to 10,000s of thousands in one day.

Some of these bugs are what are called toxin producing.

Cooking can kill the bugs, but not the toxins they produce.

The toxins produce the food poisoning and the bugs which cause them can survive on the packaging of the chicken so you can be contaminated when you touch the packaging.#

I got one variety last year, 10 days in intensive care, organ failure with a Central Line in, not a lot of fun.

A central line goes into your neck, you cannot move and you have wires and monitors all over the place.

You would not enjoy it, it is horrible, no privacy at all.

Best not to reheat your chicken to avoid this scenario.

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We don’t reheat roast chicken per se, but we have it in curry and stir fry basically since being married 40 yrs now all but .

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artangol, in future if you plan to do this again then just cook the meal as before but immediately put the half you’re not going to eat back into the oven and leave it turned on until the next time you want to eat it. Then you can be sure that it stays safe and no little critters will make it unsafe.

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Thank You, Swimmy. It just seemed odd that this fresh chicken in a foil tray carried the warning but l’ve never seen it stated on the cellophane bag of a whole fresh chicken.

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Mel, What brilliant advice, l wish l had thought of that!
I will do that in future as l know, burned toast is supposed to be good for indigestion…well, that’s before they found out carcinogenic food can cause cancer.

You’re not just a pretty face… are you? :laughing:

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Did you mean leave the oven on? As in keep it hot until the next day? Not sure my meter could cope with that :joy:

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Agree about due to legal action.

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In that case you could go and buy a bale of hay from your local farmer and dig a hole in your back garden to make a hay oven…

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Well, that’s a new one on me. :thinking:

I had a look at Ocado website and all M&S chicken has it on, including the whole ones, and so do Ocado’s own

But people have always reheated meat from the roast chicken to make different dishes, curry, pasta, pies etc haven’t they?

And then stewed up the carcass for stock and soup? I’ve always done it and I’m still here

On the budget food group, we are all very into “Rubber” chicken recipes, that is, stretching a roast chicken to make as many meals as possible, we call it rubber chicken because it’s elastic and stretches so far!

I think maybe they are just covering themselves and being cautious

As long as you cool it quickly after cooking, store it in the fridge I’m sure it would be OK

I know you have to make sure it’s reheated to a hot temperature or brought to the boil, not just warmed. I’ve never measured the temperature you need, just hot, but one website said 75F.

So if you want to reheat it for a second roast dinner it’s better to simmer it in the gravy until it starts to bubble and boil, rather than just warming it

And you should only reheat it once

Also, in microwave, make sure you stir and turn it, because microwaves have cold and hot spots and you need to make sure it gets zapped all over

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I did a bit more digging on the Ocado website and all M&S meat says do not reheat

Including steak, sausages, mince and bacon?

So I shouldn’t make a quiche with bacon in and then reheat it, or freeze and reheat it?

And if I make a big bolognaise, I can’t reheat it the next day? Or freeze some for another time?

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