Chicken at 165°F, steak at 130°F – and trust your thermometer.

It depends on the meat, but the short answer is: cook chicken to 165°F, cook ground beef and pork to 160°F, and steaks or chops can go as low as 130°F if you let them rest.

The “safest” numbers from the USDA are designed to kill everything instantly. Those are fine for ground meat (where bacteria get mixed inside) and poultry (salmonella risk is no joke). But a whole steak or pork chop? The surface is the danger zone. You can pull a steak at 130°F, let it rest a few minutes, and it’s perfectly safe – and actually good.

I always cook chicken breasts to 165°F in the thickest part. Burgers I do 160°F. But a ribeye? I pull it at 128°F and let carryover take it to 132°F. Never been sick. The real trick is using an instant-read thermometer, not guessing by color.

The one exception: pre-stuffed meats or anything mechanically tenderized (like some cheap steaks