Why does salted pork, beef jerky, strawberry preserves, etc. not spoil?

Question

I have to do this for a science project. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

Salt sucks almost all of the water out of the food, and without water bacteria cannot grow and thrive.

Answer 2

The salt in pork and the beef jerky is a preservitive. The strawberry preserves is canned and is sealed to preserve it.Some things in the store have the presertives added to them for freshness.

Answer 3

actually - all of them can spoil if they get moist.
Salt pork and strawberry preserves can also spoil if they have the wrong bacteria introduced to them.

For the most part - they don't spoil because they are treated. Salt is a preservative for the pork
air and smoke are drying agents for the process of preserving the beef
extreme high temperature of boiling and then air tight packaging preserves the strawberries.

Answer 4

There is an acronym used in food sanitaion called FAT TOM which stand for the six things that living organisms need to survive. If you deny one or more of those the organism will not survive
F - Food or lack of . Organisms need to eat something
A- Acid or base Changing the pH of an organisms environment will of course alter it's ability to survive.
T- time - in a favorable environment how much time are you allowing an organism to reproduce and or create toxic waste products. Less time is of course better and safer
T- Temperature :Organisms can survive and often rapidly reproduce at certain temperatures.
The area of optimum survivabiltyi s called the Food Temperature Danger Zone and is usually l regarded as between 40-140 F.
If a chef can get a food product into and and out of the Danger Zone rapidly, he can minimize the possibility of food borne illness.
O- oxygen By denying an aerobic organism oxygen you of course kill it. Ergo vacuum packing However there are anerobic organisms - botulism- that thrive on oxygen free environments
M- moisture; Life needs water and micro- organisms need a lot of water . A food product doesn't have to be completely dried out, it just needs the water it does have to be unavailable
to little critters.
Back to the question
Salted pork does two things : to some degree it removes water and because its salt, it changes the pH
Beef Jerky- water denial & pH
strawbery preserves; Temperature- they are given a boiling water bath, Acidity - strawberries are acidic and Moisture because sugar solutions are hygroscopic , they retain water and therefore deny it to micro-organisns

Answer 5

The salt and drying it out. It's been used from Mideval times to keep beef from spoiling.

However, the Preserves are just common chemicals use nowdays to preserve it.

Answer 6

Because salt is a natural preservative. And strawberry preserves have preservatives.

Answer 7

salt and sugar have been used for many years as a natural preservative so that is why they don't crap out on ya in a short time over the long haul they just turn into leather with no moisture at all

Answer 8

It keeps it from decaing and it preserves the meat. Sailors used to do it to fish in the old days on ships. They used to cover the fish in salt and eat it at a lter date. On the boats.

Answer 9

i recognize pork jerky and devour all of it the time! some kinds are difficult and chewy and somewhat not undemanding to devour. yet some are gentle and almost melt on your mouth. I actually have made my personal pork jerky too! merely so sturdy ;)

Answer 10

because of the type of preservatives they add....they spoil it just takes much longer