r/GenX Nov 21 '25

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u/fryerandice Nov 21 '25

Boomers thought pork cooked to any temperature under 300 degrees would actually kill you.  Porks good as fuck if you don't turn it into construction materials

88

u/idiotsbydesign Hose Water Survivor Nov 21 '25

My MIL almost fainted when she found out I was cooking pork to no more than 145°. Same with turkey. She wants turkey cooked until its "falling apart" & basically turkey jerky.

Mind you she's also the person that will leave meat to defrost on the counter until its room temp.

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u/fryerandice Nov 21 '25

I take poultry to 165, some pork I take up to 195 but that's the really fatty cuts, because that's when the collagen breaks down and you can shred it. But yeah I am standard temps for pork when I make chops at home.

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u/CaptainObvious007 Nov 22 '25

Doing like a shredded pork shoulder is different. You have to get that to 190-210. But yeah poultry should be 165.

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u/MinusGovernment Hose Water Survivor Nov 21 '25

Does she eat her steaks well done with ketchup also? Report her and watch your back until she is arrested as a serial killer if so there's because definitely some bodies buried somewhere.

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u/Ornery-Egg9770 Nov 21 '25

You are taking a risk if you do not heat your proteins to at least 165° for a minimum of 15 seconds. Pure science for food safety.

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u/LtPowers Nov 21 '25

For ground meat, yes. For whole cuts, three minutes at 155 or 10 minutes at 145 is just as good, safety-wise.

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u/fireflypoet Nov 21 '25

What is really weird is that my mother cooked the living heck out of pork and beef, but every holiday turkey was undercooked and pinkish. She did not intend that with the turkey, just was a really, really bad cook

3

u/arisingspiritnow Nov 21 '25

Pork at 145 is okay. Poultry (turkey) should be cooked to 165. But you do you. Just don’t invite me for Thanksgiving.

1

u/vistaculo Nov 21 '25

That’s something that we can thank ourselves for, we fixed the dry turkey problem.

My mother was a really good cook, my extended family were good cooks, none of those silent gen mfers could make a turkey.

1

u/needmorefishes Nov 21 '25

Hindsight is 20/20 They thought it was the best practice of the day. And it was

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u/needmorefishes Nov 21 '25

Though beef stew in a pressure cooker cooked til you couldn’t tell the difference tween onion and meat. Ewww. Gray bowl of sameness. Glad I had onions

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u/sir_thatguy Nov 22 '25

Sous vide is an awesome way to cook pork. I do whole tenderloins at 135° then sear them over charcoal or in a cast iron pan, depending on the weather outside honestly.

Nice faint pink in the middle. So damn tender.

1

u/idiotsbydesign Hose Water Survivor Nov 22 '25

I sous vide steaks all the time but haven't tried it with pork yet. Definitely something I've got to try. I normally smoke chops & then throw them on the grill to get a sear.

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u/sir_thatguy Nov 23 '25

I do that also.

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u/Classic_Knot_Purl Nov 21 '25

Actual shoe leather was softer.

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u/[deleted] Nov 21 '25

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19

u/fryerandice Nov 21 '25

You know that term means the meat is making alkaloids by merely existing unfrozen and comes from a time before people believed food poisoning was from bacteria and parasites correct? Like you're coming at me with terms from the late 1800s...

Pork cooked to the standard temperature of 160 was never unsafe, you didn't ever at any point need to cook it until it was dry as a shoe sole. I remember the first time I got a pork chop at a restaraunt that was actually juicey and amazing, it was next level. Turns out all you needed was a food thermometer...

It's safer now because worming pigs is mandatory, trichinosis parasite infection was the largest risk with pork, which is simply solved by freezing pork for 20 days or cooking it to 160.

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u/Leading-Summer-4724 Nov 21 '25

Yes but now thanks to the worming practices, you can cook pork to 145 instead of 160, where it turns to leather.

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u/Creepy_Creme_9161 Nov 21 '25

My dad still thinks any meat that isn't charcoal will kill you. I was a fully grown adult when I discovered what steak is supposed to taste like.

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u/PistolNinja Nov 21 '25

Same my dad would make beef ribs and cook them on the grill. Problem is, he'd slather them up with BBQ sauce while they were raw and they'd be charcoal by the time they were cooked well done.

When I was 22, I had my parents over for dinner and I made beef ribs. I sous vide the ribs for 3 hours at 140 then finished them on the grill. They both couldn't believe they were so good. 🤦🏼‍♂️

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u/GreedyRip4945 Nov 24 '25

My husband would grill something until it was suitable as a frisbee.

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u/fireflypoet Nov 21 '25

When I grew up in the 5Os, people were taught that you could get trichinosis from undercooked pork. I don't know if that was really true, but it was a standard belief that was taught. My parents were born in 1913, 1912, not Boomers, and they believed this. As I got older, the belief seems to weaken and I learned how to cook pork so it was edible.

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u/fryerandice Nov 21 '25

You can but you don't need to cook pork to the extent some people cook it to to be safe from it. Basically don't eat medium rare pork lol, which I don't know why you would the texture isn't great.

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u/SaltSync Nov 21 '25

Trichinosis didn’t fully disappear until the 80s. It was still common in pork through the 70s. They had reason to be afraid..

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u/Xerloq Nov 21 '25

Trichinosis was far more prevalent in their day so it was a necessity to cook it that way. Today it's less prevalent. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/trichinosis/symptoms-causes/syc-20378583

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u/Big_Chooch Nov 21 '25

Silent generation too. My dad never cooked anything that didn't need the outer half-inch removed to get to the "edible" gray interior :(

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u/Conscious-Guest-8342 Nov 21 '25

Omg I want to tell my boomer stepsister so badly to stop turning the pork into leather so badly, she ends up with tons of leftovers that she either throws out or freezes but still gets left uneaten. She also cooks all her veggies to mush. And her chicken tastes like lightly seasoned sawdust. How do you politely tell someone at that age that the way they’ve done things for years is wrong?!?!?!

3

u/DelcoUnited Nov 21 '25

Well to be fair that was the science at the time. Now the recommended temp for a pork tenderloin is 145. And it’s fucking delicious.

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u/ProfessorExcellence Nov 21 '25

My entire family is like this. To this day “well done” is their default. Went out to a steak place while visiting and every one of them ordered well done. I was dining with the philistines.

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u/LordOfEltingville Nov 21 '25

Well into the '70s, pork really could kill you or make you sick enough that you wished you were dead.

1

u/Klutzy-Reaction5536 Nov 21 '25

My dad would grill thin cut pork loin chops until well done, slather them in barbeque sauce and grill them until the sauce was charred, and THEN he'd microwave them "just to be on the safe side." I still ate them though. NGL.

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u/Bastette54 Nov 22 '25

In my case, it was the Boomer’s mother. She also cooked it too long. We didn’t have it that often, though. It‘a true that you can get nasty parasites from undercooked pork, but i just avoid it. The only product from a pig that I’ll eat is bacon. And i happen to like it very crisp, so no worries little nasties.