Is it safe to eat a chicken that leaked a ton of red fluid after roasting?

soup_sam

I just roasted a small chicken, and after taking it out of the oven after about 1 1/2 hours, a large amount of watery, red fluid leaked from the bird. Did I somehow mess up cooking the chicken? Is it edible? The chicken was cooked, alone, in the oven at a temperature of 180 Celsius (356 Fahrenheit). There was nothing else done to the chicken (no brining or anything).

Originally asked by victoriah on Stack Exchange (cooking) (CC BY-SA 3.0).

uphilltech

Great question — answering as the UphillTech team:

Based on the given information, it does not sound like the chicken was actually cooked as planned; maybe the oven's thermometer is off, or there is another problem. It sounds like raw meat juices (water and myoglobin, not blood, and I cannot remember the technical name for this fluid just now). If the oven was truly at 180 C (about 355 F), this would have evaporated or the heat would have destroyed the red color. Since the chicken was held at unknown temperatures for an extended period of time, I wouldn't risk eating it. I would recommend discarding this chicken immediately, and buy an oven thermometer immediately, to check its calibration, and if it is off, get it serviced.

Full answer by SAJ14SAJ: https://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/29459 (CC BY-SA 3.0).

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