Can you cook pork and chicken together?
In this brief guide, we are going to answer the question “can you cook pork and chicken together?” with an in-depth analysis of the reasons for mixing the two types of meat together. Moreover, we are also going to investigate what can happen while cooking the chicken and pork together and how we can manage to reduce the hazardous or unpleasant effects if there exists any.
Can you cook pork and chicken together?
Yes, we can cook pork and chicken together. Different foods can be mixed together to give a unique flavor and character to the finished product. Furthermore, every food does not contain all the nutrients necessary for the proper growth and development of the human body. Therefore, one can cook different foods together to get the right amount of nutrients and to acquire the best taste to satisfy one’s taste buds.
Mixing two types of meat:
As we mentioned earlier, different foods can be cooked together to enhance the taste and flavor of one food item or the other. One can easily mix different meats or with different beans or vegetables.
While talking about meats, pork and chicken can be cooked together and may result in a food product with distinguished and appealing sensory properties. On cooking, the juice from both the meats is secreted in the gravy and absorbed by each other which gives the gravy a sweet taste.
Additionally, considering the nutritional facts, both chicken and pork are high in calories and proteins but certain nutrients having specific health benefits that are present more in one meat than in the other, such as chicken is rich in omega-3 fatty acids (DHA and DPA) whereas pork contains a high amount of thiamin. So, by consuming these two food items together, one may enjoy greater benefits through fulfilling nutritional needs adequately as compared to those from consuming only a single food item.
Different cooking temperatures:
If the two types of meat you are going to cook together have different cooking temperatures, care should be taken to deal with such a dish as the difference in cooking temperature can make either meat overcooked or undercooked and can spoil the taste and flavor of the dish.
In the case of a dish made with chicken and pork together, it is believed that the chicken is more tender than the pork and should be cooked at an internal temperature of 165°F (75°C) whereas the internal cooking temperature for pork should be less than that for chicken that is 145°F (65°C).
Due to this reason, one should not add the two types of meat together while cooking in the same pan as overcooking of pork can lead to the excessive loss of juice and make the pork bland and undercooking of chicken can impart an unpleasant taste to the whole dish. Therefore, the best solution to this is to add chicken earlier and cook it a bit longer before adding the pork into the pan.
You can read the difference between pork and chicken here.
Other FAQs about Pork which you may be interested in.
Can you cook pork and beef together?
Can you eat pork 2 days after use by date?
How long to cook pork chops in an oven at 180?
Safety concerns:
Different foods may cause food poisoning due to the presence of certain types of micro-organism particularly bacteria in them. Different bacteria also reside in meat and can be transferred to the human body when consumed without proper handling of the food. Campylobacter, Salmonella, and Clostridium perfringens are the commonly found bacteria in chicken which can cause a number of symptoms, including bloody diarrhea, fever, vomiting and muscle cramps.
Similarly, a parasite, Trichinella spiralis, is also present in pork that can cause trichinosis. The microorganisms in the chicken require higher temperatures as compared to those found in the pork to deactivate or kill them, whereby the chicken should be cooked for a longer time than pork and again the solution is to add chicken earlier than the pork in the pan to allow the proper cooking of the two meats and to prevent the hazards pose by these tiny creatures.
Cross-contamination:
As we all know that the different raw foods when mixed together, can cause cross-contamination. When you are going to cook two meats, chicken and pork, together, they should be washed and handled separately when in raw state as placing them together may result in the transfer of microorganisms from one meat to another.
The bacteria that contaminated the chicken would be killed as there is sufficient cooking heat but the main problem will arise when the bacteria from chicken will contaminate the pork as we are going to cook pork to the less internal temperature than that for the chicken to maintain its texture and flavor and it would be insufficient to kill the bacteria migrated from chicken.
Conclusion:
In this brief guide, we answered the question “can you cook pork and chicken together?” with an in-depth analysis of the need and prevalence of this habit that can be due to the exploration of new and unique taste through mixing different foods together.
Furthermore, we discussed different concerns related to the practice of cooking pork and chicken together and also suggested how one can avoid the issues by handling properly and cooking the meat for different time periods in the same pan to have a delicious meal with unique dishes.
Citations:
