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fermenting Cracked mason jar during mash storage. Discard mash?

Sam & Oliver

Sam & Oliver

I think i know the answer to this? But i figured i'd ask here so that others might learn.

I put a 1/2 gallon of my mash into the freezer for long term storage. Ball jars are freezer safe. But this one cracked at some point and if i thawed it out, would probably shatter the glass or leak out.

Here's the question: is the mash now unsafe to consume that the jar cracked? It doesn't look that bad of a crack, except the crack goes completely around the bottle? It doesnt look like any chips are missing.

Gut feeling is that i just lost about $50
In pepper mash.
 
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IMO..it sucks to have lost £50 but if you chuck it away at least you will still have some feeling in your gut. Better to be safe than sorry. You can make another batch of the mash anytime but if you eat glass your guna be shitting that out for months and that's after it's ripped it's way through other parts of your body.

Feel your pain though.. spent a whole weekend lovingly caring for a chilli con carne only to pull it out of the oven to serve it up and I chipped the inside of the pyrex lid. I knew it was in there but couldn't find it. So ended up having "eggs on plate" instead that night for tea.
 
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It is probably not dangerous if it was in the freezer - I freeze and thaw fresh and roasted peppers all the time, dont see why the mash would be different.

I would probably boil it when it thaws out to be safe since now all the good bugs are probably dead from freezing. I dont know about trying to let it keep fermenting - maybe just sauce it up as is.
 
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Well, I always say Better Safe Than Sorry and I suppose you could remove everything you can see while it's frozen perhaps even rinse it under hot water to wash anything away from the outside of the mash and then process it running it through a fine mesh sieve or something like a juicer to remove as much pulp / residual glass as possible BUT, you never will know what might have passed through so back to the original statement of Better Safe Than Sorry and next time refrigerate not freeze the mash.
 
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Flamecycle said:
It is probably not dangerous if it was in the freezer - I freeze and thaw fresh and roasted peppers all the time, dont see why the mash would be different.

I would probably boil it when it thaws out to be safe since now all the good bugs are probably dead from freezing. I dont know about trying to let it keep fermenting - maybe just sauce it up as is.
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I think he's more concerned about a piece of glass in the mash then the mash having "bugs" in it.

A wise man once told me "When in doubt, throw it out"
 
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Any break in any glass material, or any possibility of contamination & I throw away the entire batch.

That's hobby batches, for me & friends - not even stuff I sell.

I had an Oster glass blender crack. I don't know if it cracked while making the sauce, or if the crack was pre existing and I just noticed it when it was full of 200 degree sauce. It was a small batch...about 1 blender full.

I scrapped it. It sucked because I'd spent the last several hours chipping onions, garlic, roasting peppers & lightly smoking them. But since I didn't know if there was a chip of glass in the sauce, down the drain it went.

For the kitchen I'm about to rent I bought hairnets, forearm nets, double breasted chef's smock, bistro apron, and have nitrile gloves - i'll have an assistant washing utensils, and none will be used twice without being washed. For tasting I'll spoon into a ramican & cool use once & wash. No cross contamination anywhere. I will pasteurize, blend as heat to 200 again just to ensure hot packed sauce.

I'm just sayin - it might sound like overkill, but there's no such thing as too much food safety. Especially with a hot packed acidic food.

I have liability insurance for the batch-crafted sauces. That doesn't mean I want to use it.
;)

I'd scrap the broken jar & anything in it.
 
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[sup]There was a contractor at work who would eat and entire coke bottle for 20 bucks! I saw him do this about 3 times. He'd occasionally cut his lip or tongue just a little. But he certainly never showed any ruptured gut symptoms If the crack was clean and doesn't appear to have missing fragments, I'd go with it. .[/sup]
 
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