The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service has not changed its grilling chart for Memorial Day weekend. The agency's three numbers are the entire stack a cook needs to keep a backyard out of an emergency room: 165°F for any poultry — whole, breasts, ground, or wings; 160°F for ground beef, pork, lamb, and veal; 145°F for whole cuts of beef, pork, lamb, and veal, with a three-minute rest. Fish reaches 145°F. Pre-cooked hot dogs and leftovers should be reheated to 165°F. [1][2]

The plain-English version: the chart is not advice, it is the temperature at which the specific bacteria that send people to the hospital are killed. Salmonella and Campylobacter on chicken die at 165°F. E. coli O157 on ground beef dies at 160°F. Color is not a reliable signal — a pink burger can be safe and a brown burger can be undercooked. An instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the meat is the only way to know.

The chart intersects two other open stories today. The CDC's backyard-poultry salmonella outbreak — 184 sick, 53 hospitalized, one dead, 78% with backyard-bird contact — is the reason 165°F is non-negotiable when a family raises its own chickens. The week's FDA recall page, with ice cream and powdered milk pulled for contamination risk, is the reason cooks should also check the back of every package before lighting the grill. [3]

-- NORA WHITFIELD, Chicago