Costco’s rotisserie chicken sparked debate after an unhappy customer took to TikTok, claiming she’d been sold “medium rare chicken”. But her viewers were less than convinced.
Despite its delicious reputation and nutritious benefits, chicken is a food safety risk. Raw chicken often harbors harmful bacteria, such as Salmonella and Clostridium, that result in food poisoning if consumed.
Therefore, it’s no wonder that serving raw or undercooked chicken is a big no-no in the food service industry. One unimpressed shopper, however, thought she’d encountered just that after purchasing a rotisserie chicken from Costco.
Sharing the pink-tinged chicken on TikTok, user ‘ala112_’ sarcastically wrote, “Thank you Costco for the medium rare chicken.” But her viewers disagreed.
“Uhhh, that’s [actually] very cooked. The pink actually indicates that the chicken was very fresh before cooking,” one person commented. “It’s rotisserie, that’s how it looks [laughing out loud].”
Another pointed out, “You can see the striations in the meat. You can’t see the fibers in raw chicken.”
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And it seems this isn’t an unusual case, with many stating that this was just how Costco’s rotisserie chickens always looked; “It’s literally [worldwide] knowledge that this is what cooked chicken looks like from every Costco.”
Nonetheless, ala112_ maintained that the meat was definitely undercooked, defending her stance through various comments; “I promise you it was pink.”
However, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) states that pink meat is still safe to eat so long as all parts reach “at least 165 °F as measured with a food thermometer”.
According to the USDA, pink meat is often the result of “chemical changes” that occur during cooking. They write, “Often meat of younger birds shows the most pink because their thinner skins permit oven gases to reach the flesh.”
If worried about the color of your Costco rotisserie chicken, reheating it to this temperature will ensure safe consumption. Check out all the latest entertainment news on our page here.
