Eating Raw Meat

Yitzchok_Bernstein_30651

Is any cut of quality beef ok raw? I've only seen Ribeye and Round. Technically a minced short rib should work too, right?
Once we are on this subject, what makes veal or lamb ok to eat raw, is it a specific cut? A certain age? etc...

Chris_Young_80640

Here's the basic idea. The inside of a healthy muscle should be sterile. So whether ribeye or round, beef or lamb, none of this matters. The concerns, however are:



(1) The surface of meat will have bacteria on it. Doesn't really matter what cut, tenderloin or shortrib, they've both been handled and their surfaces exposed to the word. So the question is how much bacteria and of those, are any likely to be harmful? If you blanch or sear the surface, that will reduce the risk by killing the bacteria where they live. You can also do things like wash the surface of the meat in the same way you would wash any other raw food.



(2) Has something been done to the meat during processing that would bring bacteria on the surface deeper into the meat? It's a fairly common practice for producers to use techniques like "blade-tenderizing" that involves poking lots of small holes in the meat. This makes a somewhat tough cut, or lower-quality grade of meat, a bit better. Places like Costco do this, and unless you look very closely, you may not notice this has been done. Obviously doing something to meat that could carry surface bacteria deeper into the meat increases the risk to you if you eat the meat raw.



It's important to realize that nearly all food has some risk associated with eating it. We could all eat sterile canned foods all the time, I suppose, but that's probably safety overkill.



My advice, make certain that the cut of meat you're using has not been punctured in some way, choose cuts of meat that are relatively tough and flavorful, do rinse them, consider blanching and then cutting away the surface layer of the meat if you really need to reduce risk of getting sick, and then mince and enjoy.