I lived in Africa, too. Where they never refrigerate eggs and the delivery guys leave dairy products in the sun for hours on end. Never got sick once.

I've left meat sauce out overnight dozens of times. When you reheat, just make sure it boils and let it simmer/bubble for at least 10 minutes.

It'll be fine.

Don't be rude, some people don't have enough money to just throw away $20-$35 and a huge meal that would have lasted a family multiple days had it not been left out. Not everyone is as privileged as you might be, think before you judge and keep your rude comments to yourself.

Anonymous wrote:I lived in East Africa where we never owned a fridge and just stored food on the kitchen counter overnight and it was fine. As someone said, as long as there is no meat/fish, it should be fine!

she said there was meat in it.

I lived in East Africa where we never owned a fridge and just stored food on the kitchen counter overnight and it was fine. As someone said, as long as there is no meat/fish, it should be fine!

I'm shocked this is a question. Yuck. I understand when people are desperately trying to avoid throwing out breastmilk, but meat sauce? WTF?!

Not only would I throw it out now, I would have thrown it out at 9 pm. Food needs to go in the fridge immediately. When it's just sitting on the counter being warm, it's happily growing bacteria.

Here are the government guidelines on food safety, with respect to leftovers: http://www.fsis.usda.gov/factsheets/Leftovers_and_Food_Safety/index.asp.

Throw it out. Next time put in a shallow dish to cool, then put in the fridge! No foil!

No. I am the OP of the chicken stock thread and I am going to toss it. Yes the chances are small but do you want to risk your family vomiting... Or worse just because you didn't want to waste your neighbor's food?

There are these "I left my food out all night what can I do?" Threads constantly now. Everyone says the responsible thing is to toss it. If it has meat especially, toss it. Same for each post

No no no no no no!

Read the last post again carefully. Is there any question in your mind whether you should eat it or toss it out?

Just bring it to a boil for a good 10 minutes and it is fine. Learned this from my MIL in West Africa- she uses leftovers without a refrigerator all the time and neither she nor visitors (includinv weak stomach Americans)are ever ill...

if it didn't have meat i would say use it. but probably not a great idea with meat out for 12 hours +

Toss

A neighbor brought me homemade spaghetti sauce which has ground up turkey meat in it with veggies. It was in tubberware containers then wrapped in foil. She brought it over at 5:00pm, just cooked and it was hot. At 9:00pm, it was still sitting out on the counter. I went to put it in the refridgerator but the foil was still hot to the touch, so I told myself I would leave it out for another hour. However, I fell asleep. The next thing I know is it is 7am and the sauce sat out all night. Do you think it is safe to reheat and eat or do I toss it all out?