We’re all guilty of it - over-ordering when we get takeaway. Everyone has eyes bigger than their belly and we end up with half of the menu sitting in front of us, not knowing how we’re going to eat it all.
So, the morning after, you open up the fridge to a carton of pilau rice and a fair few curries. You’re mega excited to get stuck in, so it’s time to reheat yesterday’s dinner.
It still smells delicious, looks pretty darn good too, and you might even have a hangover, so a curry would be the perfect cure.
You’re 100 percent sure you’ll be able to reheat the curry, as long as the chicken is piping hot. But what about the rice? Can that be reheated safely?
According to the NHS, and the Food Standards Agency, rice can give you serious food poisoning – as bad as meat, even.
We don’t know about you, but this is something we’d rather avoid…at all costs!
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The Food Standards Agency explains: "It's not actually the reheating that's the problem – it's the way the rice has been stored before reheating."
There is some good news though - you can take steps to ensure that you don’t encounter harmful bacteria so you can enjoy your curry with rice. How else are you going to mop up all that delightful sauce?
Rice contains spores of a potentially harmful bacteria strand called Bacillus Cereus. These are small cells which are capable of reproducing quickly and might make you feel unwell if they’re allowed to manifest - gross.
If rice is left standing at room temperature after it’s been boiled, these spores might become bacteria which can be damaging and produce toxins which cause vomiting and/or diarrhoea.
This usually comes about 1 to 5 hours after the consumption of the dodgy food. Symptoms are relatively mild and usually only last about 24 hours, but it’s best to err on the side of caution when reheating your rice.
If you leave rice for too long, the more likely it is that you’ll get ill.
After cooking rice, it’s best to eat it pretty soon after, but anything left over, cool it quickly, but not immediately in the fridge.
The NHS recommends doing so within an hour. After it's cooled, put your rice in the fridge. It'll be fine for a day or so.
Like any cooked food, rice should be 'steaming hot' after reheating.
The NHS stress that rice should not be reheated more than once.
