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20-Year-Old Dies From 'Fried Rice Syndrome' After Eating Leftover Pasta (www.iheart.com)

submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/weirdnews

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Ripped parts of the post:

The bacteria is best known for causing a type of food poisoning called "Fried Rice Syndrome," since rice is sometimes cooked and left to cool at room temperature for a few hours. During that time, the bacteria can contaminate it and grow. B. cereus is especially dangerous because it produces a toxin in rice and other starchy foods that is heat resistant and may not die when the food it infects is cooked.

And

Unfortunately, that was the case for a 20-year-old student, who passed away after eating five-day-old pasta.

His story was described in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology a few years back, but has since resurfaced due to some YouTube videos and Reddit posts. According to article, every Sunday the student would make his meals for the entire week so he wouldn't need to deal with making it on the weekdays. One Sunday, he cooked up some spaghetti, then put it in Tupperware containers so that days later, he could just add some sauce to it, reheat it and enjoy it.

However, he didn't store the pasta in the fridge, rather he left it out on the counter. After five days of the food sitting out at room temperature, he heated some up and ate it. While he noticed an odd taste to the food, he figured it was just due to the new tomato sauce he added to it.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Ive been told you MUST let rice cool on the counter before putting it in the fridge. My brother in Christ, that's how you die.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

.......................no it isn't.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Letting stuff cool a little is better for your fridge though. I don't think you run much of a risk from an hour or two, bacterial growth starts slow and accelerates exponentially.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It's more than that.

If you don't let it cool, you risk warming the other food you have already cooled to unsafe levels.

I'm pretty sure refrigeration of hot, bulk preparation items are a reason why your local restaurants get shut down or get violations.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

I actually first typed out a paragraph with my thoughts that this could be an issue, but wasn't sure enough of myself to post it and deleted it. Thanks for inadvertently confirming my suspicion!

I hadn't even thought of restaurants, but it's interesting this can be an issue even with their larger fridges.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago

That opening paragraph implies something different from the final paragraph (of the bit OP posted in this thread). Opening paragraph says a few hours, but the guy left his pasta out for the full 5 fucking days between cooking and eating it.

I'm one that generally prefers to not waste food but I won't touch pasta or rice that I've accidentally left out overnight. Wtf was wrong with that guy?

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago

Letting it cool for like 2-3 hours is perfectly fine, putting large quantities of near boiling hot stuff in the fridge might warm it up and decrease the lifespan of other stuff in the fridge.