I just put a 5lb chunk each of fatty pork and beef brisket deckle
(leftover from corning the flat) in the unused side of the kitchen
sink to thaw overnight. They're each wrapped separately in gallon
Ziplocs and have a layer of heavy duty foil over top of them. I'll
be making sausage tomorrow.

They'll probably still be frozen in the center tomorrow morning, and
the temp of the outside of the meat will not be above 40F - probably
closer to 33F because things like this thaw pretty evenly.

So why is it recommended you not thaw something like this at room
temp? Are they referring to smaller pieces of meat that may have
parts that get above 40F? I do this all the time. I will of course
check them around 4:00am just to be sure they're not thawing too
fast.

-sw