Has anyone ever used a thick piece of aluminum as a temp transfer material? Seems to me like you could set the meat, still wrapped on it and then alternate on and off letting the piece of alluminum return to room temp in between.
I understand the concept behind this, though I do see some problems with it. The meat would need to be perfectly flat in order to have full surface contact on each side alternately to be effective. Also, I don't like the possible safety issues. It's almost the same as putting meat into the microwave to thaw...even on low power, you are intermittently cooking the meat...yes, it's a low rate of energy transfer, but the meat temp is being raised well above freezing, and then, that thermal energy is transfered to the meat adjacent to that which was warmed. Knowing this, I won't use low and slow cooking methods with nuke-box thawed meats. The 40-140* / 4-hr rule starts when you begin the thaw in this case, IMHO. It's fridge thaw or a quick water thaw for me, or else it gets grilled instead of smoked, if I'm doing the cooking.
I don't even like the idea of counter-top thawing at room temp anymore...not even when covered with towels, and I used to be the guy who'd toss a 4-5lb pack of meat on the counter-top (without even a towel to cover it) and walk away for 3 or 4 hours, not even thinking twice about what the possible consequences may be...never again.
I have actually used a four-part thaw process on really large cuts, like the 22lb 7-bone whole beef rib I smoked a few weeks ago, for example. This involved removing the frozen meat from my -20* freezer and placing into a 20-25* fridge for several days. This first step just allows the meat to gain some temperature, and loose some of the chill from the freezer. Then, I gave it a 3-hour cold water bath (cry-vac packaging) to bring the internal temp up closer to actual thawing temp, and placed it in a 34-36* fridge overnight. Final thawing before the smoke was with another shorter water bath. Using this or similar methods will keep the surface of the meat in a frozen or near frozen state for the longest period of time prior to smoking/cooking, and keeping the temp below 40* which is the max recommended storage temp for raw meats. IMO, by doing so, you will be reducing the risk of bacterial colonization during prep and the first stage of cooking (40-140* surface temp for un-punctured whole muscle meats).
I know we talk alot about safe cooking temps and safe times in which to reach these temps. Not alot of discussion goes into safe thawing practices, and what are recognized as being acceptable/safe methods, so it's a very good thing to ask about any thawing methods you think of. You've now sparked my interest in finding out more details on thawing...I now have a research project
Eric