EDIT: Solved! Thanks to everyone who commented.
I’m talking about [this](https://ch-it.openfoodfacts.org/product/4099200059402/huhn-suss-sauer-aldi)
It’s basically a box that was on the shelf, un refrigerated, that contains cooked chicken. How are they able to keep cooked chicken shelf stable for so long?
In: 321
Your question is going to get removed because it is easy to look up the answer.
The package has to be airtight to prevent contact between the air and the food. The food must not have active bacteria on it and the moisture needs to be controlled.
Found preservation is as old as humans.
We use high salt concentrations, think beef jerky.
We can use sugar, thick of jams, jellys and honey.
We can use wax, think of cheese.
We can use heat, think of ultra high temperature (UHT) milk.
We can use acids or bases, pickles and olives.
We can use dehydration, think powdered milk.
We can excluding air, think canned and jared foods
Your chicken has been made shelf stable by one or more of those methods.
EDIT. radiation. Not commonly used in foods. Also the autoclave. Heat and pressure.
Also freezing!
There are several things helping to preserve meals like that.
Before being packaged, the meal is cooked and heated to pasteurize it. It isn’t cooked and then cooled off and then packaged, it’s packaged while it’s still too hot for pathogens to grow and sealed up so no more can get in before it cools.
Once sealed, there is very little oxygen inside. Many dangerous pathogens do not need oxygen (or will die around it) but most of the stuff that will spoil food requires at least a little oxygen to grow. That limits their growth and keeps the food from going bad and growing nasty stuff even though it’s at room temperature. Since it was pasteurized, there’s little chance of anaerobic pathogens getting in that can survive without oxygen.
That doesn’t mean that *nothing* is inside the packaging, just that what manages to survive the heat is probably encysted, meaning it’s inactive and incapable of growing until conditions are better. Conditions will not be better for as long as the container stays sealed.
Many of these kinds of meals require water to be added. Like oxygen, most pathogens require some water to grow. The food is dehydrated enough that most stuff won’t grow and, like oxygen, the seal prevents moisture from getting in through the air.
Many of these meals have additional preservatives that are harmless to humans in the tiny doses found in the foods, but dangerous enough to the pathogens that might try to grow. Again, it probably won’t kill *everything* but it keeps the things from leaving their protective cysts so they can’t reproduce and can’t eat your food (and then poop in it).
Many of these meals have a lot of salt. Salt is a natural preservative because it helps dry out pathogens. Water naturally flows through membranes from areas of low concentration to high concentration: too much salt outside means water will flow out of the cell and into the salty stuff. The extra salt helps preserve the food.
Once you break the seal and open up the package, you’re probably about to cook the food so it doesn’t spend very long sitting around until you pop it into the microwave and heat it back up. That kills whatever pathogens managed to survive until that point. Anything left after that is too weak and too few to do much to your body. Your stomach acid or, failing that, your immune system will take care of anything that actually makes it into your stomach.
I ate one of those meals and wondered about that when I felt ill afterward. Nothing bad, just nausea for a couple hours but I will not be buying those again.
I ate one of those meals and wondered about that when I felt ill afterward. Nothing bad, just nausea for a couple hours but I will not be buying those again.
Nitrogen Gas.
Nitrogen gas also possesses the ability to displace oxygen, creating an oxygen-free environment that minimizes oxidation and extends the shelf life of packaged foods. Additionally, nitrogen gas inhibits microbial growth, ensuring the safety and quality of the products.
They have special packaging machines that are oxygen free.
Nitrogen Gas.
Nitrogen gas also possesses the ability to displace oxygen, creating an oxygen-free environment that minimizes oxidation and extends the shelf life of packaged foods. Additionally, nitrogen gas inhibits microbial growth, ensuring the safety and quality of the products.
They have special packaging machines that are oxygen free.
Food safety standpoint, microbial contamination is what you would be concerned with.
Microbes need certain things to cause harm, including
1. The right acidity/PH
2. The right temperature
3. No adverse chemicals
4. Time
5. They need to exist in the first place
6. Food
7. Many times. Oxygen. Anaerobic microbes exist but they take a very long time to grow, that’s a special consideration.
So by sterilizing (2) you get no microbes (5). And then by sealing it you solve (7, 5)… For a long time (4).
Eventually if the seal breaks you introduce microbes and oxygen.
If it was contaminated with botulinum it will likely cause the seal to break due to gas escaping (or puffing out) But that is the point of sterilization, to kill the spores.
Food safety standpoint, microbial contamination is what you would be concerned with.
Microbes need certain things to cause harm, including
1. The right acidity/PH
2. The right temperature
3. No adverse chemicals
4. Time
5. They need to exist in the first place
6. Food
7. Many times. Oxygen. Anaerobic microbes exist but they take a very long time to grow, that’s a special consideration.
So by sterilizing (2) you get no microbes (5). And then by sealing it you solve (7, 5)… For a long time (4).
Eventually if the seal breaks you introduce microbes and oxygen.
If it was contaminated with botulinum it will likely cause the seal to break due to gas escaping (or puffing out) But that is the point of sterilization, to kill the spores.
Since it’s from Europe I take it, combination of pasteurization and probably UV-C sterilization?
Since it’s from Europe I take it, combination of pasteurization and probably UV-C sterilization?
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