Over cooked meats Heterocyclic amines are a group of 20 chemical compounds formed during cooking. They are found in meats that are cooked to the well done stage, in pan drippings, and in meat surfaces that show a crispy brown crust. Epidemiological studies show associations between intakes of heterocyclic amines and cancers of the colon, rectum, breast, prostate, pancreas, lung, stomach, and esophagus, and animal feeding experiments support a causal relationship. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Public Health Service labeled several heterocyclic amines as likely to be carcinogenic to humans in its most recent Report on Carcinogens. Changes in cooking techniques have been shown to reduce the level of heterocyclic amines in meat. This is from Wikipedia Another is Acrylamide is caused from heating starchy vegetables like french fries. is another carcinogenic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acrylamide Frying foods changes the oils into trans fats and now the FDA has said this is the cause of heart problems. Be careful how you cook it could kill you.
I am not well versed with cooking especially meat that's why I am not aware of the bad results of overcooking. We normally use the pressure cooker for beef to make it tender before cooking. One time we bought ox tail and I was the one assigned to monitor the pressure cooker. Oh no, I was engrossed on my phone and when I looked at the time, we had the pressure cooker working for an excess of 5 minutes. The ox tails were so tender that it breaks apart when touched by the fork. Fortunately, the texture was still okay and not like powdery yet. That's a lesson in cooking for me.
I believe under cooked meats are more of a danger to health than overcooked. Also most cases of food borne illnesses come from raw vegetables. Reading all your various posts, though they are informative, would have people starving to death because they are afraid to eat anything. If you spend a few minutes searching you can most likely find a study to support just about anything. Studies can be helpful, but they can also lead people astray.
I think that what you are saying might be the case nowdays, simply because most people buy food that has been commercially grown and processed. When people used to raise their own beef and chickens , and also had a vegetable garden, then the food was fresh, and not contaminated in any way. All you had to do was wash the dirt off. I remember, even when I was growing up, you could get any steak cooked just the way you wanted it at a restaurant, and even hamburgers if you asked. No one ever got sick from eating those rare steaks back then. My mom used to make what she called "scraped steak". She would get a large round steak, which is one of the tougher cuts of meat, and then she took a butter knife and scraped bits of the meat off of the top. She would scrape off enough to put a thin layer on a slice of buttered bread, salt and pepper it, and that is how we ate it. It was still totally raw. Now, most of the animals raised for food are fed poor quality feed, and kept in small confined areas; so the have to keep them on antibiotics, growth hormones, and other chemicals just to raise them for market. Even veggies can be contaminated to where they are unsafe to eat. The other side of that is that most people are totally disconnected with the process of raising their own food. I often wonder what would happen if everyone had to raise their own livestock for food, and butcher it themselves, rather than just go and buy it all sliced up and processed at the grocery store ?
First these were not studies but fact of science. I am a meat eater and would not be a vegan because we need certain vitamins found in meats. You can look at the life expectancy of people in the US and find the people in the mid west live ten -fifteen years more than the people in the south east basic difference the south east fry everything even ice cream. The longest living people in the world [blue zones] all eat meat but they do not use oils and take in very high antioxidants and low in calories. Yes Sheldon you are right you can find a study to back up almost anything. I normally check to see who done the study who founded the study, benefits by the study, and some of their concussions can be a way off track. A good example is all the work done on cholesterol in the arteries they see this and it is what is causing the problems. Concussion from observation and not asking why is there no build up in the veins which have the same amount of cholesterol. No questions of why is it there? The scientist that studied this for years were called quack when they said it was the free radicals that were the cause and not cholesterol. Finally now even the FDA has admit they were right. and banning trans fats that cause free radical damage.
On Friday nights my gramps would come home with limburger cheese and hamburger. He would make a sandwich of onion slices, cheese and raw hamburger on thick homemade bread and wash it down with Blackhawk beer. He pretty well stunk up the house on Friday nights.
Whew ! ! That sure enough sounds like a stinky dinner. He would for sure NEED the beer to eat (and enjoy) that kind of a combination !