How many times can I cook meat?

soba

I always thought meat could only be cooked twice, eg cook raw steak, make it into a pie and cook it again.
There was quite a lot of rib beef left from Wednesday night's tea, so I've minced it and made a minced beef stew for tea tonight. However the book I've been using -The New English Kitchen (Rose Prince) suggests that what's leftover from tonight can be made into pasties, which would involve it being cooked again in the oven. Does that sound right to you?

Chocmonster7

Instead of making pasties I'd get some puff pastry, cut it into squares then cut another square about 1 cm in from the edge but don't cut right through. Cook these and reheat the mince mixture then take the 'middle' out of the pastry add the mince and put the top back on. This means you're only having to re-heat the meat on the hob which should be fine.

Linda32

soba wrote:

. However the book I've been using -The New English Kitchen (Rose Prince) suggests that what's leftover from tonight can be made into pasties, which would involve it being cooked again in the oven. Does that sound right to you?

Maybe the receipe is assuming your using raw mince, in which case the leftovers could be re-used again. Which would make your first thoughts correct.

soba

Sorry, I didn't explain properly. The recipe calls for the leftovers of a roasted joint to be minced, then turned into the minced beef stew we had tonight. It then goes on to say that any mince left from tonight's tea can be made into pasties. So that means it'll have been cooked three times in all. One time too many I think.

dronid

I believe that you can recook meat and treat it as freshly cooked a couple of times at least. I probably wouldn't try to keep the Sunday roast going for a more than a week but I've certainaly done it a couple of cooks. I think it needs to be treated like a fresh meal, not just reheated

saving-grace

I would agree with you soba i.e. cook meat then reheat it only once.
If I had enough meat left over for two more meals I would divide it up and reheat half of it on one day for one meal and the other half kept refrigerated then reheated separately for another meal
I think this is what the book meant you to do
Every time you reheat meat then let it cool down you are increasing the opportunity for bacterial growth.