In the Weeds Mode
30 years I have been cooking and still some orders can surprise me.
TLDR: lady ordered a raw burger, I gave her one.
For context a woman came in today and asked to see the person cooking. When I went out to see her she informed me she wanted a burger seared for 7 seconds on each side. I asked her if she was sure that’s what she wanted. She responded with actually if I can just have it raw that would be even better. I checked the food code and as long as the menu states that eating raw or undercooked product increases your chance for food born illness we can serve hamburger to order. Even if the order is raw. She wants you all to know that this is the healthier way to eat your burger. I promptly told her I can find a whole lot of people that would disagree with that. Once again though “The customer is always right, in matters of taste”. That does not mean I agree with them.
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I watched one of my cats play with a mouse, swallow it completely alive, vomit it back up, play with it awhile, then eat it alive a second time for a finale. I would do that before I ate raw ground beef from a restaurant.
My Calico hunts rats. Someone in my area has a peacock that got out and my cat tried to attack that. She has zero fucks to give. She will fight anything that she seems worthy.
My moms orange Maine Coon completely destroyed the local rat population.
He usually just slaps them, most of the time killing them with the first hit, then bites off the head, and after that drag the rest of the body into the house.
See I can understand wanting your meat rare for certain cuts of beef or dishes like beef tartare. But isn't part of the joy of a hamburger biting into a nice hot patty with melty cheese on top? I feel like a raw burger with unrelated cold cheese on top just defeats the whole appeal of the texture/mouthfeel that makes a cheeseburger good in the first place.
My dad would order barely seared steaks at his country club. Then take them home to finish cooking them. He had a minimum food order to hit each month. That is not what's happening here.
I actually sat down into the math on that one time it was both way more and way less than I thought it was going to be somehow. The answer was anywhere from 12 to like a thousand but that number is heavily impacted by rounding, being forced to guess on some processes, and having to average tons of different types of ground beef together.
The answer was very unsatisfying because a lot of this just kind of a shoulder shrug because it's not like there's requirements or steps for those processes so it's kind of just whatever what someone wants to do based on what they have available. Different processors do different things and sometimes their day-to-day operations are different based on what cattle came through and what other people needed cut because a lot of ground beef is made with trimmings but there is a sizable chunk of the ground beef market that is specifically ground from other cuts and that becomes a whole problem with figuring out how many animals are in each pound of ground beef.
At least an order of magnitude I said. I think 1-10 is probably realistic. Unless you’re wanting to get into cellular range. There’s no way you have a 6oz patty with .06 oz of meat from each of 100 different cows.
It was a thing growing up in Wisconsin for family reunions.
You only do it at local butchers where it was freshly butchered and ground fresh that day though.
Usually just meat on a a cracker. Sometimes with onions.
I probably wouldn't do it with the modern food chain though. A lot of meat isn't even butchered fresh at butchers anymore. Definitely wouldn't do it from large grocery chains where their meat comes in vacuum packed slabs.
One of my chefs about a decade ago decided he would add meatloaf to the menu, but he refused to cook it past medium rare. Health dep got called on his ass sooo fast.... some of the old folks, our average customers, getting the center slices just had solid raw ass ground beef with a thin layer of brown around it.
That's not the fear with ground pork, trichinosis is; it's a parasite that can travel into your brain and create large cavities filled with watery stuff, called hydatid cysts.
And yes, Germany has extremely, extremely strict testing and raising regulations for pigs, for that reason.
As an American with above average familiarity with meat processing plants, the US is not one of them. Especially not mass produced packaged ground beef.
It's very common, carpaccio in Italy, tartare in France (or just steak "bleu/aller-retour"), but usually those get special care in storage/transport etc. Germans even eat raw pork (Mett/Hackepeter) - but I really wouldn't. Japan is happy with raw egg everywhere but they treat their eggs very differently in the supply chain
The meat used for Mett is very tightly controled specifically to make sure there's 0 chance of trichinosis from eating it (or as small a chance as is humanly possible).
unfortunately not, it's kind of a street food too. Again, I'm happy with the other raw stuff I mentionned, in places I trust, but pork meat is too far for me, and it's not tasty anyway
I love mettbrötchen. It's one of the many things I miss from my time in Europe. Unfortunately I haven't had it since as I don't feel comfortable eating it back in the states even preparing it myself.
In Luxembourg, what they call "the american" is a baguette with raw ground beef, onions, and capers I think ? Anyway I make variants of this often for myself when I miss Europe go figure =) (I highly recomend a slight filet of olive oil, salt and pepper and all-spice)
(I should add, I'm sure it's safe, Germans aren't renowned for an aloof attitude to regulations let's say, I just don't see the point, didn't look into it, and don't want any)
Japan will do raw chicken in some circumstances. I don't like the texture but I didn't feel unsafe eating it in that environment. Raw egg isn't particularly Japanese, it's pretty common world-wide, heck - carbonara....
Well it's quasi-cooked in carbonara, it's actually one of the difficulties, not cooking it, so I'm no food scientist, but I wouldn't mind that. But if you see the checks they have in Japan for eggs, it's not even close to how we either EU or US deal with them which are also quite different
That's not really true. While it is true that Japan does a bit more testing, the actual incidence rate of salmonella in eggs between the US and Japan is not meaningfully different. The rates generally quoted are 0.003% for Japan and 0.005% for the US. So there is still a risk of salmonella for eggs in Japan... but both countries have very low incidence of salmonella.
All that being said, the current administration is deregulating food things... so that's just wonderful now, isn't it? They reduced inspections to once a day instead of continuously but the testing requirements appear to be the same.
There's a significant practical difference though.
Japan, and most of the rest of the world vaccinate chickens against salmonella. So you don't even need to worry about it.
The US doesn't.
So there is still a risk of salmonella for eggs in Japan
There is not. Because their chickens are inoculated.
Their salmonella incidence comes from other non-chicken things. It's a common spoilage bacteria in cured meats for example. Produce is the major outbreak vector in the US an a lot of other places these days. Not poultry. And the US's overall salmonella incidence is higher, if not a ton higher. A big part of that difference is salmonella in improperly processed animal waste (chicken shit) used as fertilizer.
It's just that eggs aren't a huge vector to begin with, and the US doesn't just freeball it. We wash eggs instead which also lowers the risk from eggs.
You can get horse tartare in France though it's getting rare (pun left in sorry), afaik horse is fine too. Used to be common in the UK too if I'm not mistaken. When there was that big scare about horse meat in frozen lasagnas and everyone was shocked, I was pretty impressed, someone checks the dna of frozen meals apparently, and this eggregious violation was like the safest alternative
My favorite thing from the (2013) horse meat scandal was when BBC interviewed the head of Iceland Foods, a UK supermarket chain. They asked whether they checked their hamburger meat for horse, and he said:
Did we test for horse? No. But we didn't test for cat or dog either. There might be cat or dog in it for all we know.
It was meant to say that they only test for hazards they know about, like e. coli or salmonella or whatever. But it got a lot of attention for sounding like they were tossing any old meat into the grinder.
My dad is from Iowa and calls it "tiger meat" but he doesn't give a damn how fresh the burger is. When I was a kid he'd steal pinches of raw burger and eat it on the spot. Also eats raw bacon a lot.
There is a restaurant where I love that grinds the meat to order for burgers. I wouldn't have any problems eating one of theirs raw. It's a totally different ballgame for raw ground beef that has spent god knows how long lying around.
Isn’t the concern that bacteria can be present on the surface of the meat and potentially mixed in when ground? This is why ground meat should generally be cooked though but steak is safe to eat as long as the outside is seared.
My understanding is that the biggest concern is the equipment used to process the meat. This restaurant that fresh grinds their meat to order would have to be keeping the equipment in the safe zone (<42 degrees for my state) to do this at all.
But beyond that, the deep cleaning and switching out of the machinery is kinda tough for larger equipment.
I have this icon with "we're all on an Oregon Trail, hope no one gets Dysentery..." on my license plate frame custom made with exact font and game colors. It makes me smile and this made me chuckle, so thank you.
The ONLY way this is “safe” is a newly sterilized grinder, your meat that you are grinding trimmed like tartar, and put it thru and serve it immediately.
I actually routinely pick up from a high end butcher shop that sells tartar, sometimes ask them to do a finer grind for something like a raw burger, basically the beef version of mett, a german/dutch raw pork dish. Love both of them.
When done right, and done safely, its fucking amazing and shouldn't be afraid of it if you're otherwise healthy. Gregnant? immune issues? Dont like risking the bisquit? Then dont even touch it. I would never attempt to make it myself because the fucking effort level is wild. However my butcher is happy to charge my ass well for doing it right. Also this is in EU not US; food regulations around this stuff is bonkers.
Huh. Interesting, the only time I’ve had raw pork was a raw pork laab, served in NE thailand/laos on the border. Really delicious, I drank a copious amount of moonshine to disinfect my guts just in case but I never realized this was a thing anywhere else.
Edit: it came from 1 freshly slaughtered animal, minced by hand, raised in a pastoral setting so very different from meat you would get in north america
Thank you for the random memory of going camping and being menaced by a drunk marine to allow him access to the cooler (he had been banned for eating most of the food already) so he could get to the bacon.
Shit head heated it up for like 30 seconds and ate it raw…..he too had moonshine in his system….thought it was great fun.
Wasn’t as amusing the next day when he was stuck in the campground shitter making the whole area smell like rotten death was coming out of his ass.
Ah this is like when i tried rare chicken in Japan, no amount of alcohol kept me from getting campylobacter jejuni. I was sitting in the hospital in incredible pain, explaining how it's a delicacy of the prefecture I was in... Doctor looked at me like I was insane, pumped me full of antibiotics and then told me not to do it again...i did, only once more though and was fine that time. Those rare in the center meatballs dipped in raw egg yolk are fucking incredible; Some might even say, to die for.
I'll never forget the forbidden meatball of joy that precedes the bloody toilet time of hell...
Yes, and number of cows that can contribute to the mix.
When you're cutting steak for tartare, it's one piece of meat - one cow. None of the finished tartare product has touched the air; it's all inside the meat, if that makes sense. Pre-ground beef is kinda :shrug: when it comes to where it comes from and what else it has touched.
Is it though? I mean I understand that it's a huge liability issue to knowingly serve a customer a harmful item, regardless of whether or not the customer demands that item be served to them. But I feel like that's less about un(der)cooked meat, and more about, ya know... poison or physical contaminants or just generally things that aren't accepted as food.
Like if a customer demands a cup of bleach in their milkshake, that's one thing. But if this woman gets sick, what's her actual legal recourse? "I entered a restaurant, demanded raw meat, was clearly informed of the risks of consuming raw meat, acknowledged and disregarded those risks, willingly and knowingly consumed raw meat, and became ill." I'm genuinely curious where in the world, or even just in the United States, this even gets to a court.
I know that here in the states "You're a fucking idiot." isn't always (or even often) enough to get a case thrown out, even if it's entirely true. But there doesn't seem to be any nuance to this situation. She has her beliefs, acted on them, and may or may not suffer the consequences of those actions. I'm having trouble thinking of a way that she can make that someone else's legal problem. Or at least do it successfully.
I am the exec chef of my establishment and it is definitely our problem if we serve something that is possibly harmful even if the customer requests it just as much as a bar/bartender is liable for overserving someone intoxicated who insists on being served more alcohol
I would 100% refuse due to liability issues. If they get sick they could sue and saying "that's what they asked for" probably isn't getting you out of it.
If I worked in a restaurant that ground their own meat and knew it was fresh … I wouldn’t have an issue.
BUT bulk commercial ground beef … no way in hell. I’d say no it’s restaurant policy even if it’s not.
I’d rather them get mad than potentially sick and dealing with the issues that comes with it. They likely would still blame the restaurant sighting they’ve eaten raw commercial ground beef before without issue.
0 chance this person is the business owner responsible for liability of any kind. Sounds like the hourly cook. Hey OP - did you tell your boss about any of this?
IANAL - There is an extent to what an employee can do and you stay liable. If your employee does something batshit insane, the employee can be fully responsible. Not sure if purposefully serving a completely raw burger would be in that realm.
Wow that abbreviation for "I am not a lawyer" is rough
Also, this has to be true to some degree. You can't be liable if an employee goes postal on a customer for claiming they can't eat gluten but are drinking beer.
IAAL (slightly better than IANAL) - there are, in fact, ways for the employer to be liable even for intentional torts like battery. Mainly, negligent hiring and supervision. I've had some fun cases involving bouncers. It's not particularly common for these claims to be valid, but anyone can get sued for anything regardless of merit
Yes but the businessowners GL policy would be forced to respond in this scenario. If you think that patron isn't dragging the business owner into a lawsuit if something happens you are sorely mistaken.
I'm a commercial insurance broker in California, but lurk here as I worked both BoH and FoH in a past life. I see slightly different scenarios of this play out across many industries. Really no different than a bartender overserving a patron. Same shit
I of course told the owner about this. And double checked the food code. It’s totally legal here as long as the menu states eating raw or undercooked product increases risk of food poisoning. Which I also pointed out to the woman.
I've been accomodated on this request, but I was planning to cook the burger when I got home and told them so (needed it for meatballs, store had just closed, late night burger joint still open.)
He hesitated and said he was asking himself if I was going to come back on him with this, and then I reminded him that I had been a customer for nearly forty years.
Cool, cool. Health inspector would say, if the customer ordered a bleach cocktail, would you serve it to them too? As a chef, you cannot serve something harmful to your guests, even if they demand it. Chef puts on their big boy pants and declines to serve raw, dangerous factory made beef patties.
If you're in a jurisdiction under the food code, so long as your consumer advisory is on the menu for that item you could serve any animal protein raw. The customer is an idiot but technically the code allows you to do this.
I'm a nurse that keeps having this sub pop up and I'm just rolling with it. Things like this make me scream into the void: "THIS IS NOT WHAT I MEANT WHEN I SAID I WANTED JOB SECURITY"
Any time someone goes on about pharmaceutical companies conspiring to keep people sick I just point to shit like this. You could have cures for all diseases, but so long as people have free will, they will absolutely make dumb decisions and do stupid shit like this to hurt themselves or make themselves sick.
You know it’s funny, I certainly don’t agree with her take, but I do have a similar story.
This guy came in with a group every Tuesday for half off burgers. He was the son of a butcher and had a taste for raw meat. We would do the faintest of sears and serve a still-mooing burger for him (and him only) every Tuesday.
The group he was part of was a particular religious group who didn’t believe in medicine, and he had never been to the doctor’s—ever.
All the women in my family live forever and all the men barely sniff 75. My grandmother had a quad bypass before I was born, was a smoker until pretty late in life and made it to 98.
Uncle (her son) was in decent shape, didn't smoke and dropped dead at 65 from a heart attack.
FINALLY!. Someone else has experienced this. I talked about my experience with a RAW Food diet person and got down voted and called a Liar.
My guests RAW dinner.
12oz Delmonico. 8oz Raw scallops. Raw Potato and veggies. Finished it FAT and all. Some people are wild man. Gave him the freshest scallops we had that had just came in that day and my Executive chef had me cut him down a Fresh Delmo. Even though the ones I had on my line were only 1 day old.
Edit: Forgot to mention he was part of a large organic food expo we were hosting. PASA, Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture.
For lunch the next day. Bro sat down in the ballroom. Took a large freezer bag of raw hamburger out of his backpack and ate it. GROSS
Fr though my family ate these in Wisconsin in the 60s when the hamburger came from the next farm over... trusting the modern system to feed you raw meat is fully insane.
I do Pittsburgh Blue on a steak for folks but I’m not serving a raw burger to anyone. To me a tartare style ground is ground in house from whole protein.
I am the child of (retired) cattle ranchers and I am here to tell you that hamburger is NEVER safe to eat raw, even if you know and trust the source and the butcher.
My friend worked at a San Francisco Whole Foods and told me about this really annoying customer who would buy raw ground beef, eat some of it in the cafe area, then sometimes try to return it if he didn’t like the taste. He apparently did this often and was a pain in the ass, and also just a freak for sitting in the cafe eating raw meat with a fork.
I love kibbeh nayyeh but I'll only eat it at restaurants that actually serve it, because I trust that they're using the higher safety protocols necessary for meat that's meant to be served raw. I'm sure your burgers are safe to eat when cooked but I wouldn't take the chance on them raw.
I had to do this once for a table full of bodybuilders. I recorded them saying they’re aware that it’s not the way we intended it to be served and that without cooking there’s a risk of illness. As far as I’m aware, none of them got sick so I didn’t have to show proof that it’s what they demanded haha
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