The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service did not change its Memorial Day grilling chart for the third day this week. Poultry — whole or ground or in pieces — reaches 165°F. Ground beef, pork, lamb and veal reach 160°F. Whole cuts of beef, pork, lamb and veal reach 145°F with a three-minute rest. Fish reaches 145°F. Pre-cooked hot dogs and leftovers are reheated to 165°F. The 40°F-to-140°F danger zone holds perishables for no more than two hours, or one hour above 90°F. [1]

The paper's Friday brief treated the three numbers as the household-action stack. The Saturday-of-the-holiday version adds the one instruction the chart cannot communicate by number: do not rinse raw chicken under the kitchen faucet. USDA has issued the no-wash-chicken instruction every Memorial Day for more than a decade. Washing aerosolizes Salmonella and Campylobacter across an eighteen-inch radius around the sink — the cutting board, the counter, the dish drainer, the silverware caddy. WUSA9's recurring service item is built on the same USDA finding. [2]

The epidemiology behind the instruction is the cost of ignoring it. FSIS attributes 128,000 hospitalizations and roughly 3,000 deaths per year to foodborne illness, with summer spikes that track holiday cookouts. Half Baked Harvest's May roundup runs 31 Memorial Day recipes; the chart and the instruction are what makes them safe. [3] Color is not doneness. The thermometer is the read. The chicken does not need washing. The three numbers and one instruction are the entire service piece. [1]

-- NORA WHITFIELD, Chicago