Can you cook chicken and beef together? (3 Points to Know)
In this can brief guide, we will answer the question, you cook chicken and beef together? We will discuss some reasons you need to avoid cooking chicken and beef together. We will also discuss elaborate methods and precautions to take if you decide to cook chicken and beef together.
Can you cook chicken and beef together?
You can cook chicken and beef together but you shouldn’t avoid cross-contamination. The primary reason is that the two meat take different lengths of time to cook. Beef is tougher than chicken and takes a relatively long time to cook. However, the safe temperature for chicken is higher than that of beef, due to the risk of contracting salmonella.
If you cook chicken and beef together in the same pan at the same time, you run the risk of letting one of them remain raw. Chicken and beef have different densities, graininess, and water content, hence cooking them together will cause one to overcook and the other to undercook.
Some recipes will encourage you to cook chicken and beef together including Chicken and beef stir-fry.
You can cook chicken and beef together if they are pre-cooked and you need to make a final dish. Meat that has been cooked is safe and can not negatively affect any other food.
Another instance where you can cook chicken and beef together in the same pan when you are using either minced form of both types of meat or finely diced or sliced forms.
According to the USDA, you can place beef and chicken on the same grill to cook. The catch is that you cook chicken at a higher temperature. Chicken needs to be cooked to an internal temperature of 165 Fahrenheits to ensure its safety. On the contrary, beef must be cooked to a temperature of 160 Fahrenheit.
Chicken and beef, both take around 30 minutes to cook perfectly. TO make sure, that the texture of meat reaches your liking, you need to cook them separately.
What are some other reasons to avoid cooking chicken and beef together?
Chicken and beef are both excellent sources of protein and their taste and texture have different nutritional values to offer. It is not practical to cook chicken and beef together. Both the meats are worlds apart and do not cook or taste well when put together.
Moreover, there aren’t many popular recipes that use both the meats together. The taste and texture profile of both chicken and beef is wonderful, however, when put together, it may become a recipe for disaster.
Some other factors that would hinder the process of cooking chicken and beef together are of different cuts and forms.
We would not recommend that you cook, chicken and beef if they are cut into breasts or steaks. It may seem possible if the beef steak has been pounded and made into thin slabs. If chicken becomes underdone in such an instance it could be a health hazard.
If you put chicken drumsticks or cuts with bones, they will take significantly longer to cook than beef steaks. If beef is still on the bone, then using pressure cooking or stewing will work better.
How would the taste and texture be impacted if you cook chicken and beef together?
Even though some may enjoy unusual food experiences but there is a reason there aren’t many recipes that use beef and chicken together. Beef and chicken together in a single dish do make for a good recipe.
When both are cooked together, the beef flavor tends to overpower the chicken. The delicate and exquisite flavor of chicken is masked by beef. What you will get as a result is beef-flavored chicken.
How should you manage if you need to cook beef and chicken together?
If it is for time or convenience, you can opt for grilling the chicken and beef which lets you handle the meat pieces independently. Moreover, you can keep a safe distance between the two kinds of meat to avoid cross-contamination.
If you need to cook the beef and chicken using the same recipe, then you can easily take turns. First, start with chicken because it does not spoil the pan and leaves minimum residues behind. Before you toss in the beef and start cooking, you need to rinse the pan with soapy water to avoid contamination.
Choosing to cook beef first would be a safer bet for you, but cleaning up the pan will take a longer time. Not only there will be visible debris to clean up but the intense flavor would make its way into the chicken.
In this brief guide, we answered the question, can you cook chicken and beef together? We discussed some reasons you need to avoid cooking chicken and beef together. We also discussed elaborate methods and precautions to take if you decide to cook chicken and beef together.
