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I just want to minimize dishes taken to a BBQ--marinating pork chops in a lemon/herb/olive-oil baste along with some chicken skewers. Is there anything to worry about with trichonosis when preparing pork in same dish with other meats at room temperature? I can't imagine it's a problem, but you never know...

hobs
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Don't worry about the pork contaminating the chicken, but rather vice versa. A good rule of thumb with chicken is to treat it as a biohazardius contaminant. Because it is. Salmonella is present IN chicken meat, unlike other meats where you will only find microbes on the surface. Your marinade doesn't seem particularly inhospitable to pathogen growth, so cross contamination would be a nontrivial concern. OK, if you overcook your pork chops as some insist on doing, it shouldn't be much of a concern. However, may as well be safe and split the marinade between two ziploc bags. It's a small effort to mitigate risk.

Sean Hart
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    @Sean_Hart In the North America, Yes. In Malaysia? – TFD Dec 20 '11 at 20:13
  • @TFD, better safe than sorry seems like the right way to go regardless of location. In Malaysia all pork is imported from western sources (Australia mostly). Muslims don't eat pork. So Sean's advice probably still applies, at least for my circumstances. – hobs Dec 20 '11 at 22:25
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I wouldn't worry about trichinosis. In the years 1997-2001 there were 21 pork related incidents in the entire US - so only 5-6 cases a year.

http://www.rightdiagnosis.com/t/trichinosis/stats-country.htm

soegaard
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    I'm assuming it's going to be cooked, which makes the odds practically nil. – Aaronut Dec 20 '11 at 14:41
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    @soegaard What if this guy doesn't live in North America? The World being somewhat larger than USA :-) – TFD Dec 20 '11 at 20:14
  • @soegaard, thanks for the concern about my location in Malaysia, but I'm still as unglobal as most Americans when it comes to statistics. Interesting how rare Trichinosis is in the States. – hobs Dec 20 '11 at 22:22
  • @TFD Yep, the world is larger than the US (in Denmark myself). I did jump to the conclusion that hobs was in the US. Just now I tried searching for statistics from Malaysia, but couldn't find any. – soegaard Dec 21 '11 at 11:47
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I spent a few minutes Googling this and it seems like most of the posts I read that advised against it were more "better safe than sorry" type responses than anything grounded with experimental data. Furthermore, your specific marinade has lemon juice, which will make it harder for bacteria to grow.

I personally think you're safe...but I do want you to reconsider what you're bringing. If you're going to BBQ chicken and pork marinated in exactly the same thing, won't they taste pretty much the same? It doesn't seem worth it to even get the second type of meat for the flavor/variety payoffs. It'd be like buying BBQ Lays and BBQ Pringles together.

Eric Hu
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    Yea, I'd normally agree. But somehow it turned out OK. The pork+lemon juice tastes significantly different than chicken plus lemon juice. Both tasted great despite overcooking (per the accepted answer) and the shared marinade. – hobs Dec 20 '11 at 22:29
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I always marinate meat in a plastic ziploc bag. Cleanup is simple and you can squeeze out most of the air so the meat is well coated with a smaller amount of marinade. I wouldn't mix the meats because the flavours should stay separate.

rguenther
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  • Yea, ziplocks are great for maximizing the marinade contact. But I'm a bit of a greenie, not a big fan of "disposable" plastics nor BPA, and tumbling/shaking a hard container every couple hours is almost as good at distributing marinade. – hobs Jan 01 '12 at 21:12
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If you don't want to use zip lock bags, Use two different containers. Do not mix poultry with pork.

Chuck
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  • Hello, and welcome to Stack Exchange. A bit more information on why this would be a problem would make this a better answer. – Daniel Griscom Dec 09 '16 at 21:51
  • Thank you for the welcome. And you're right. My explanation should have been better. Rather than writing a long explanation, I invite those interested to go to this link, https://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/food-safety-education/get-answers/food-safety-fact-sheets/safe-food-handling/be-smart-keep-foods-apart/ct_index – Chuck Dec 09 '16 at 23:23
  • Thank you for the welcome. You're right. I should have explained myself better. A full explanation regarding cross contamination can be found here: – Chuck Dec 09 '16 at 23:25
  • Thank you for the welcome. You’re right. I should have explained better. For those who are interested, you can read about cross contamination here: https://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/food-safety-education/get-answers/food-safety-fact-sheets/safe-food-handling/be-smart-keep-foods-apart/ct_index – Chuck Dec 09 '16 at 23:29
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    Those are good links, but at the least they should be included in the answer rather in the (generally deemed non-essential) comments. Even better would be including the linked information right in the answer text, as links are fragile. – Daniel Griscom Dec 10 '16 at 00:44