Depends on the food but most goes in. In addition to cooling, the refrigerator is critter proof (ants, mice). Not bread not catsup but most all leftovers

Rural US, no dietary restrictions, 40, married with children

I leave food on the counter all the time, because If I’m still hungry in a little while, I don’t want my food cold. I have never in my life gotten food poisoning from it.

Northern Europe. Omnomnomnivour.

Sometimes forget to put the lunch boxes in the fridge over night. No problem eating them the day after.

If I thaw meat I don’t have an issue with it being room temperature for a few hours before I cook it. Better than somewhat frozen.

That being said if I ran a restaurant I’d be much more careful. Best way to scare off customers and get the food safety inspector to hit you with his clipboard.

Omnivore/Central Europe:

I am pretty special in my needs because i hate eating leftovers when they were out “too long” (where “too long” is a very random amount of time), so i normally wait until the food is room temperature; if i don’t plan to eat within the next few hours it goes into the fridge pretty much instantly. But i know that this is my personal spleen and that it would be fine much longer.

Bread, any fruit, onions, potatoes, garlic and so on stay outside tho.

It’s more important to make sure that your kitchen and cooking utensils are clean, and anything that was used for preparing meat doesn’t get reused; and the dishes must be heated properly - that alone would mean it’s probably save to stay out overnight if it’s not 30°C in the kitchen in the midst of summer.

So as a person who’s been in that back area of a restaurant, we all know the danger zone is anything above 40F to 140F and the closer you are to that median temperature that median temperature the faster that bacteria multiplies, meat, vegetables, doesn’t matter, as long as the temperature’s right and there’s enough moisture there, they’ll breed like bacteria and there are bacteria that leaves toxins behind that will also make you sick.

So given that, I’ve always put stuff into the fridge as soon as were done eating generally following the two hour rule and it’s been sitting out for more than four hours without refrigeration, I’ll usually toss it.

Dutch omnivore. I will sometimes leave something on the counter overnight. Usually when I made a big pan of something which I can’t fit into the fridge. But it’s something that will be reheated/boiled. Like a soup or stew. My wife complains about it everytime I do that though 😄

This is a thing pushed by American media. It’s a Boomer-era panic over summertime picnics and somehow mayonnaise causing potato salad to immediately after 30 minutes outside a refrigerator to become fatal if consumed.

It’s also the product of misunderstandings of buying meat at a supermarket, wrongly assuming that meat that is not refrigerated for more than 15 minutes will basically kill you.

Panicking about food poisoning is a moral panic about “bad parenting” and blaming people when it wasn’t widely known what causes food poisoning: not washing your filthy hands, cross-contaimination, and poor hygiene overall.

I’ve lived in West Africa and bought and cooked and safely eaten meat that had sat on a wooden plank lightly covered in flies before I got there to buy it. I survived. Mayonnaise will outlive humanity before it molds or goes bad at room temp.

Vegetarian/Germany. I’ll leave food on the counter too as long as I’m still planning to eat it the same day. Never had issues. If I’m planning to only eat it the next day, I’ll refrigerate it.

American/meat-eater

Bread stays out but is wrapped

Butter stays out in a butter bell (that’s not a common thing in America BTW but they should be)

Some sauces and condiments and such that are packed full of salt and vinegar and such stay out

Leftovers and such go into the fridge after a few minutes to a few hours, there’s not exactly a hard rule here, just kind of based on what feels right and whenever we get around to it. Overnight is too long, with few exceptions if it’s been out that long we’d probably throw it out.

One exception to that is if I make stock, there’s a good chance that’s going to sit out for a good while to cool down. It takes a while to get a big pot of liquid down to a reasonable temperature to put in the fridge. I also figure it’s been simmering for several hours, so odds are there’s no bacteria alive in it, so I throw a lid on it to try to keep it that way, especially when I do it in the pressure cooker because it’s basically been autoclaved at that point and it’s staying in a pretty damn close to totally airtight vessel.

Most vegetables and fruits are fine out on the counter for at least a day or two, and some will last weeks or months depending on temperature, humidity, how much light they get, etc. but most of them last a lot longer in the fridge so that’s where they go. Onions, garlic, potatoes, pineapples, and bananas always live outside of the fridge. Other things like apples, citrus, tomatoes, peppers may go either way depending on how fast I’m planning to use them and how much fridge space I have. Cut-up produce always goes in the fridge.

Couple stories for you. Had a tray of 100 hot wings we ordered one night drunk. Left it on the counter for 3 days straight eating out of it until they were gone. They never were brought above or below room temperature for that entire time. We didn’t die.

I also regularly order too much food. Forget to fridge the leftovers, and still eat the crap the next day. I’ve yet to be food poisoned from this.

Maybe I am just lucky.

I keep my lunch in my work bag all day, not in the fridge, unless it’s salad where it should be crisp.

I did the European thing where I kept eggs on the counter. It’s best that way. Real unwashed farm eggs, not shit from the grocery store.

One big reason for the US guidelines being so strict is that they apply to the entire country, which ranges from Florida to Alaska and everywhere in between, and they are worst case. Plus with a massive population fed by capitalist companies that value money over lives and frequently altered food for profit, deaths in a large population are going to happen.

I don’t leave stuff that needs refridgeration out for more than a few hours so that it holds up for several days and the time varies widely by food type. Food does need to cool down significantly before refridgerating, although sometimes I will put it in within a couple hours to avoid forgetting. For most foods I have a four hour limit outside the fridge.

Commercially raised chicken has a very high chance of having salmonella. Raw chicken is only out long enough to prepare and cook. Once cooked I don’t worry anymore than anything else.

I also use the dates as rough estimates and when to pay more attention to spoilage. I don’t worry about safety for canned foods that don’t have signs of spoilage, but a soup can a couple years past the best by date has likely probably separated and textures will be off. Dates on bags of chips are a sign they are will be going stale within a few months.

Omnivore, Northern Spain.

I don’t worry too much but that depends mostly on the season because my main concern are usually house flies in the summer.
I don’t usually let stuff sit uncovered for more than 1 hour but I’ve occasionally left some covered things sit for hours in winter.

I like to find a balance between being worried about bacteria and trusting my immune system to deal with anything that comes along. However, my immune system tends to over-react to things that aren’t a threat (allergies to cherries, peaches, cats, dogs, kangaroos, pollen, dust, etc.) so I’d be pretty pissed if it couldn’t handle some bacteria.

I’ll cut the bad parts off an old pepper and still put the good parts on my omelette in the morning. I’ll cut the moldy bit off a piece of cheese and use the rest. Bread…nope. I can handle it being a bit stale, but moldy is too much. I’m not afraid of bread mold, but I don’t like the taste.

Last year I tossed the Thanksgiving turkey out the next day because my wife and I forgot to deal with it and left it sitting on the kitchen table next to the radiator. That seemed to me like it would be a bit too much of a challenge to my immune system.

Mostly vege/france. I don’t mind leaving food out in the open, especially cakes, pies and cookies. I can confirm that sometimes a few days out are too much, but as long as you check for weird scent/look, you’ll be ok. My parent recently ate boiled meat over the course of a week without putting it in the fridge, leaving it in its pot and reheating each day, they threw the last bit because it smelled bad, but they had no problem before that.