I don’t like fresh tomatoes. Generally, my careful avoidance of them is a fairly unique practice. At least, I thought so until I met Bret. We stand together in our quest for vegetables that don't leak acid on the rest of the salad.

We were on our honeymoon when the outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul in tomatoes and/or hot peppers hit the news. Many people joined our stance on tomatoes then... but it took me a while to realize it.

Since I wasn’t reading FSnet while we were gone, I had to hear the warnings put out on eating tomatoes like a regular consumer would. It was like my superhero senses were turned off.

At the time, I wasn’t in the habit of watching the news. And according to the results of a Rutgers Food Policy Institute (FPI) survey,

“The majority of respondents (66 percent) first heard about the advisory on television.”

Throughout our trip, we ate at cafes, buffets, and casual dining establishments. When we didn’t eat out, we stopped at Wal-Mart for cereal and sandwich supplies. None of those places showed signs of produce being recalled.

The survey found,

“A small minority (8 percent) first heard about it from restaurants and retailers.”

As it happened, some of the first news I received came from my step-dad’s mom, who understood the problem to be in tomatoes sold with the vine still attached.

Hearing through the tomato-vine was problematic, though. I later learned the CDC advised,

“…persons with increased risk of severe infections…should not eat raw Roma or red round tomatoes other than those sold attached to the vine or grown at home…”

Those two words, “other than”, were missed (or misunderstood) at some point in the chain of communication that ended with me.

Lead author of the Rutgers FPI report, Dr. Cara Cuite said in a press release,

“Our results suggest that consumers may have a hard time taking in many details about these types of food-borne problems.”

Almost half (48 percent) of people surveyed indicated they were not sure which types of tomatoes were under suspicion.

I was back at superhero headquarters (i.e. in front of my Mac) when Salmonella Saintpaul was found in a sample of jalapenos from Mexico, and again when the outbreak strain was isolated from a Mexican serrano pepper and the water used to irrigate it.

Most consumers weren't so lucky. From the survey,

“The researchers found that while almost all respondents (93 percent) were aware that tomatoes were believed to [be] the source of the illness, only 68 percent were aware…that peppers were also associated with the outbreak.”

Dr. Cara Cuite commented in the press release,

“This research is especially timely in light of the growing number of recalls as a result of the Salmonella outbreak associated with peanut butter and peanut paste.”
 

How can consumers be better informed? One practice seen in both outbreaks that helped alleviate some confusion was the use of club membership or “loyalty card” information to contact customers who had recently bought recalled products.

What else can be done to clear things up? After all, regular consumers don’t have superhero senses.
 

A chef in a Hong Kong noodle bar was facing a jail term Friday after admitting attacking a woman with a meat cleaver when she complained about his food.

A 47-year-old woman grumbled about the meal she was served, so Cheng Chi-wai, 50, ran into the kitchen and came back with two meat cleavers, leaving the woman with a fractured skull and a 6-centimetre long wound that needed 11 stitches. The chef was restrained by other customers.

At a hearing Thursday, Cheng -- who has been fired -- pleaded guilty to wounding with intent. He will be sentenced on February 18 after background and psychiatric reports are drawn up.
 

New York Times journalist Jane Brody suggests that eating dirt is an instinctive behavior in humans. In her article, Eating dirt can be good for you - just ask babies, she interviewed researchers who think people should eat dirt in order to stimulate their immune system.  Brody says that immune system disorders such as asthma and allergies have risen significantly in the United States. 

Although allergies do appear to be on the rise, the awareness of allergies, the ability to diagnose allergies, and the number of people at risk (the U.S. population) have also risen significantly. 

The director of gastroenterology and hepatology at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, Dr. Joel Weinstock, said in the interview,

"There are very few diseases that people get from worms. Humans have adapted to the presence of most of them. … Children should be allowed to go barefoot in the dirt, play in the dirt, and not have to wash their hands when they come in to eat…let kids have two dogs and a cat, which will expose them to intestinal worms that can promote a healthy immune system.”

Dr. Weinstock, I’m sure glad you aren’t my doctor. 

I agree that immune systems are naturally stimulated by various exposures to the environment, and that Americans use too many antibacterial products, but I question Dr. Weinstock’s knowledge of zoonotic diseases.  Intestinal parasites from animals that infect humans, since many are not adapted to humans, often leave the intestines and migrate through the body.  There are approximately 10,000 human cases of larva migrans in the U.S. each year.  Unfortunately, most of these cases are in children, and a few of these kids die.

Eating dirt is an instinct?  Not for me.  Babies eat dirt because they don’t know better.  Some may think that bad behavior is an instinct, but calling bad behavior an instinct doesn’t excuse it.  Bad advice shouldn’t be excused either. 

Dirt may have poop in it, so don’t eat it.

Multiple outlets are reporting tonight that every peanut, every ounce of peanut oil and all peanut butter and paste products produced by Peanut Corporation of America in its Blakely, Georgia plant since January 2007 has been recalled.

From the FDA website:

PCA sells its products to institutional and industrial users for service in large institutions or for sale and further processing by other companies. PCA does not sell peanuts or peanut products directly to consumers in stores.

The expanded recall includes all peanuts (dry and oil roasted), granulated peanuts, peanut meal, peanut butter and peanut paste. All of the recalled peanuts and peanut products were made only at the company’s Blakely, Georgia facility; the lot numbers and a description of the products being recalled are listed at the end of this release. The Blakely, Georgia facility has stopped producing all peanut products.

Peanut Corporation of American released a statement tonight that includes the following:

“The goal of Peanut Corporation of America over the past 33 years has always been to
follow the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s good manufacturing practices in order to provide a safe product for consumers. It is because of our commitment to our customers and consumers that PCA has taken extraordinary measures to identify and recall all products that have been identified as presenting a potential risk."

"PCA uses only two highly reputable labs for product testing and they are widely used by the industry and employ good laboratory practices. PCA categorically denies any allegations that the Company sought favorable results from any lab in order to ship its products."

"We want our customers and consumers to know that we are continuing to work day and night with the FDA and other officials to determine the source of the problem and ensure that it never happens again.”

Being proactive and keeping food that has tested positive for a pathogen off of the plates of consumers is good for public health.  Waiting until illnesses are reported is irresponsible and demonstrates a lack of concern for customers. PCA's words say that they place the utmost importance in food safety, but their reported actions suggest that investigating and fixing a pathogen problem is only important when there are illnesses, not before they occur.

As for PCA's customers, knowing the food safety practices of a supplier, no matter whether it's at a farmers market or a multi-national is really important. If they're in China or around the corner, they need to follow the rules and know how to reduce risks. This goes beyond relying on third-party audit results. Tracking where product goes and knowing what inputs went into it is the cornerstone of a good culture of food safety.

After breakfast in the morning, my husband and I go our separate ways until dinner. Bret, who studied agricultural engineering in college, designs turf equipment. That’s him at right on an old prototype mower managing the turf in our backyard.

As you all know, I studied food science and industry. With the help of Doug and Phebus, I found my way to writing about food safety.

Our worlds collided this morning when I pulled his engineering magazine out of the pile of mail in the kitchen and saw the words “food safety” staring back at me.

The cover article was by another ag engineer, Nathan Anderson, who works with the FDA’s National Center for Food Safety and Technology in Illinois.

In the article, Anderson points out that,

“Increased concern over microbiological safety in terms of public health and international trade has led to a shift in how microbial risks are assessed and controlled.”

In order to have fewer sick people and more world trade, governments are adopting new risk-based approaches to food safety management and ditching the old prescriptive control measures.

Anderson’s article describes the Food Safety Objective (FSO) approach to risk management, which sets as a goal a maximum population for a certain microbe in the food being processed.

Processors must then control the levels of the microbe on/in incoming product initially, reduce levels if necessary, and prevent any increases.

This, of course, can be expressed by a mathematical equation (since it’s an engineering concept). But I won’t do that here.

Developing processes based upon known risks—as opposed to long-standing beliefs—is a smart way to do business. Engineers just say it differently than food safety writers.

Engineer: 

burger + E. coli + food thermometer > burger + E. coli + color-based estimate

Food safety writer:

A Loblaw’s Supermarket in Toronto, Canada, is closed following a customer complaint regarding a mouse inside the store.

Toronto Public Health (TPH) officials closed the store last night, and already Dinesafe, a website designed to disclose inspection results for food premises in the Toronto area, has updated its most recent inspection findings to include infractions discovered last night, such as:

•    failure to ensure food is not contaminated/adulterated;
•    failure to prevent rodent infestation; and,
•    failure to maintain hazardous food(s) at 4C (40F).

According to Dinesafe, the Dupont St. Loblaw’s has passed the last ten TPH inspections, dating back to April 2007.  But are restaurant inspections a good indicator of the quality of an establishment? Or simply a brief snapshot of a food premise at one point in time? And are web-based disclosure systems like Dinesafe the most effective way to communicate inspection results to consumers?

News reports like the ones in the Toronto Sun or Globe and Mail, websites like Dinesafe, and blogs like this or blogTO, get the information out there to consumers. What I am interested in is which of these methods is the most effective.

Michael Rogers of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration told reporters on a conference call Tuesday that the Peanut Corporation of America plant in Blakely, Georgia, shipped out products that managers knew might be tainted with Salmonella.

"The team identified approximately 12 instances in 2007 and 2008 where the firm identified some type of salmonella ... and released the products."

Records at the plant showed that after the company tested the peanut products and found salmonella, it sent at least some to an outside lab that showed no contamination. The products were then illegally shipped for sale, Rogers said.

"There (were) no steps taken (by) the firm as far as cleaning or to minimize cross-contamination.”

An FDA inspection of the plant also found at least two strains of salmonella bacteria at the plant, although they were strains that have not been associated with the current outbreak.

Details of precisely what the FDA found will be released on Wednesday, he added.
 

A press release this weekend explained that Maple Leaf Foods now tests for listeria daily in its plants.

And it looks like the company wants to address one of the tough issues by releasing data from its microbiological testing.

The release stated,

“Over the past three months Maple Leaf has collected over 42,300 test results across its 24 packaged meat plants… Our rate of positives tests across our plants is consistently less than 1%...”

Ben also noticed a statement on Maple Leaf’s website this weekend that indicated some action on another tough issue: communication with vulnerable people about possible risks involved with eating the company’s products.

A tip sheet for consumers says,

“Pregnant women, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems should always reheat deli meat and hot dogs until they are steaming hot.”

Now, will that kind of information show up on the package?
 

Only time will tell.
 

The political power of the U.S. president just sets the stage for the presidential family to influence American culture.

I think one of the most interesting galleries at the Eisenhower Museum--dedicated to our 34th president who hailed from Abilene, Kansas (about an hour from where I write)--is the gallery filled with outfits worn by his wife Mamie. Plaques near the outfits describe the impact the former First Lady had on women’s fashion during her husband’s presidency--like many First Ladies before and after her.

Purpose-minded people everywhere hope that their cause will be picked up by a member of the presidential family and instantly regarded as fashionable.

This, of course, includes proponents of local food.

As reported by the New York Times,

“The nonprofit group Kitchen Gardeners International wants to inspire people to grow their own food in home gardens. More recently, its “Eat the View!” campaign has targeted the ultimate home garden — the White House lawn.”

According to the group’s website,

Kitchen Gardeners “are self-reliant seekers of "the Good Life" who have understood the central role that home-grown and home-cooked food plays in one's well-being.”

Across the pond, the Japan Times reports that, “public trust in food, packaging and labeling [is] crumbling across the nation,” and it’s leading consumers to “tak[e] a healthy interest in vegetables and other locally made produce.”

The article asserts,

“The vegetables and fruits are not necessarily cheap compared with supermarket prices, but people are apparently buying them because they feel safer eating products made by farmers who aren't afraid to be identified.”

It can’t hurt to know who supplies your food. However, without microbiological evidence of the safety of products and processes, there’s really no guarantee that food produced nearby—or even in your own yard—will be safer to eat than food that’s been in transit for a while.

Sick people just get the comfort of knowing who it was that let the poop get on their food.



 

I always have something on the television as background while working on my laptop.  And at this time of year, the Australian Open brings a reminder of the warmth that may some day return to the Northern Hemisphere.

When the announcer said, “This is painful to watch,” I immediately looked at the television. There was teenage tennis sensation Victoria Azarenka, of Belarus, wobbling, though leading in her match against Serena Williams.

Azarenka had been vomiting all morning, because of a virus, and she did not feel much better when she got to the court. ... She ended up retiring through illness and shuffled off the Rod Laver Arena with an assistant supporting her on either arm (right, photo by EPA). ...

At one stage, it seemed as though she was going to be sick into her cupped hands, and she repeatedly sought out the shaded areas in the stadium between points. She also looked off-balance and almost unable to grip the handle of her racket. She had little choice but to quit against the American.

No word on the type or source of what was thought to be a viral infection.
 

There’s a certain appeal to trainspotting – or watching an impending trainwreck. It’s appalling and compelling at the same time. Ben and I went to a Sloan concert in Guelph several years ago and we wanted to leave they were so bad – and Sloan is usually great – but had to stay and watch where they would descend to next.

It was worth the wait.

Amy the French professor has a similar obsession. There’s some woman who writes a blog about her meaningless life in France and Amy is hooked. Amy finds this woman’s blog posts meaningless, facile and unbelievably stupid. And she reads it every day.

Recently, French blogger’s daughter had, as Ben likes to say, the squirts: diarrhea at daycare. Mom says, “Our daycare is pretty cool about letting her (diarrhea daughter) come.”

Diarrhea in a daycare is not a good thing, but hey, poop happens. Not so sure about the quality control when the kid’s runny poop ends up on the bandage of her finger that mom had accidentally attempted to sever using a bedroom door. Read the blog and it may make sense; or want to kill yourself.

Surprisingly, the newspaper in Pembroke, Ontario, near the Barry’s Bay cottage owned by the parents of my high school girlfriend, has some tips for kids with the squirts.

Prevent the spread of viruses. Clean your hands and your child's hands often, especially after using the toilet or changing a diaper. Use soap and warm water, or hand sanitizer. If hands are dirty, hand sanitizers won't work, you'll need to wash with soap and water first.

Amy and I have been changing a lot of diapers. We wash our hands. And despite some fantastically explosive messes, haven’t gotten baby shit on the kid’s fingers.
 

I always wanted a pet turtle. When I was 10, I was really into comics (nerd alert). There was a comic book store in between my school and house, that I used to spend lots of time at, and all of my allowance. Right around that time, an underground comic book from creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird made its debut: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. What a ridiculous concept, but the coolest thing to this 10-year-old comic nerd. This was before the really cheesy cartoon, and even cheesier movies. When the Ninja Turtles were cool.

I made nunchaku and a bo staff out of broomsticks and chains from the hardware store.  I was a 10-year-old blonde-haired Canadian Napoleon Dynamite.

All of this background to set this up: I also begged my parents for a pet turtle. I was going to keep him in my room, and call him Leonardo. My parents refused and got me a cat instead.

I know it had little to do with pathogen concerns, and lots to do with the potential smell.  However, I'm grateful they shielded me from Salmonellosis.

This week's food safety infosheet is all about reptile-related food safety concerns.

Download the infosheet here.

Whenever there is an outbreak of Salmonella or E. coli in fresh produce like tomatoes or lettuce, I’m quick to stress that washing does little to remove dangerous microorganisms and that prevention on the farm is the first line of defense.

But I still wash produce. Like the tomato that some little kid may have emptied his nose on in the grocery aisle – a colleague talking about her sleepless nights notes how she’s drowning in a “sea of snot” from her kid – or been violated by norovirus-laden fingers from a promiscuous shopper, that’s why I wash tomatoes.

Yesterday the Hawaiian state Health Department urged Hawai'i residents to thoroughly wash home-grown vegetables and avoid eating uncooked slugs or snails after several Big Island residents contracted a rare form of meningitis, leaving two of the patients in comas, from accidentally eating tiny slugs on home-grown vegetables.

All contracted a rare form of meningitis — or infection of the spinal fluid — called eosinophilic meningitis or angiostrongyliasis. It is caused by the rat lung-worm parasite, or Angiostrongylus cantonensis, and is spread when snails and slugs eat parasite-infested rat dung and move onto vegetables, where they are eaten by humans.

Yesterday's advisory by the state Department of Health comes in the wake of six probable cases of rat lung-worm in Hawai'i in 2008. All those who got sick were residents of the Big Island and regularly ate fresh raw vegetables from backyard gardens.

State epidemiologist Dr. Sarah Park said,

"We are in no way saying that vegetables are unsafe. I would advocate locally grown vegetables — just wash them."

One of the journalism classes I am taking this semester is "Convergence Reporting". I am excited to learn the basics of video editing and voice recording, but I am mostly looking forward to developing interactive animations. It's a cool way to tell news.

The Sacramento Bee published an interactive map reporting numbers on Salmonella infections in California, including those from the recent outbreak (special thanks to Skyler for sharing).

The CDC website has a map displaying numbers of Salmonella infections by state, but it's not interactive. It was updated last Wednesday so it doesn't include the 7th death related to the outbreak reported this morning.

Surfing on the web I found a pretty cool "Global Disease Alert" map. If anyone out there has something interesting, please post here.

Last night I watched The Bad Mother’s Handbook, a British made-for-TV drama starring Robert Pattinson. In it, Pattinson plays a lovable nerd, Daniel, who falls in love with pregnant teenager, Charlotte. 

Though Pattinson’s role is only supporting, he has a food safety moment when he runs to pregnant Charlotte, saving her from soft serve ice cream:

Daniel Gale (Pattinson): NO! Listeria can be present in soft cheese and squidgy ice cream, so you best get a Zoom instead.

What Pattinson’s character fails to mention is why the pregnant Charlotte should avoid indulging in this tasty treat.  Listeriosis, the illness associated with Listeria monocytogenes, can be passed from mother to unborn child causing premature delivery, miscarriage, stillbirth or serious health problems in newborns, even when the mother is not experiencing symptoms of illness.  The CDC has a list of foods to avoid while pregnant (http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/pregnancy_gateway/infection_list.htm#protect).

Foods on the list include luncheon meats and soft cheeses, and although the CDC list does not mention soft serve, several studies (Sydney 1996, Wisconsin 2003) have found soft serve to have dangerous levels of coliforms and other bacteria (associated with improper equipment sanitation and poor hygiene). Australia and New Zealand list soft serve ice cream as one of the foods pregnant women should avoid consuming.

So, like Daniel said, have a Zoom instead.
 

Public health inspector and Kansas State graduate student Robert Mancini of Winnipeg (former co-host of the television series Kitchen Crimes, right, pretty much as shown), writes that Environmental Public Health (EPH) Professionals such as Public Health Inspectors and Environmental Health Officers are empowered under legislation to protect the health of the public.

In carrying out their duties, EPH Professionals interact directly with the public, industry, and various agencies to ensure that Canadians are protected from health risks such as: infectious diseases, chemical contaminants, and physical hazards. EPH duties include inspections, consultations, health education, surveys and research, complaint investigations, risk assessment, risk management and enforcement work.  EPH Professionals safeguard the environment and health of Canadians by providing services in the following areas:
 
-water quality,
-air quality,
-food safety assurance,
-communicable disease control,
-housing standards/conditions,
-recreational facilities,
-disease injury and prevention,
-waste water management systems,
-emergency planning and response,
-land remediation and development issues,
-institutions and care facilities,
-public policy development,
-occupational health and safety,
-pollution control and solid waste management,
-tobacco control,
-quality control/assurance
 

A few years ago while completing my undergraduate degree I designed a food safety presentation for grade 2 and 3 students at a local elementary school.  The demonstration used games and visual aids to evaluate the children’s knowledge of food safety in the home. The 2nd and 3rd graders knew more than I did when I was that young about food preparation and handwashing.

One of the elements of the presentation was demonstrating proper handwashing technique, and for how long to wash your hands. Like the article in the Southern Oregon Mail Tribune, I suggested scrubbing to the tune of Happy Birthday.

If you want to stay healthy this winter while everyone around you is coming down with colds and flu, sing the birthday song while you wash your hands, and don't stop scrubbing until you've finished the last "happy birthday to you."

It's not the song that's important. It's the time it takes to sing it, or hum it to yourself while you lather and scrub. You could even go for a second chorus, washing all the while.

That's the advice of doctors, nurses and others who work around sick people all the time.
Turns out some children don’t sing Happy Birthday any more, so we sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star instead.

I walked past the washroom before lunch break when leaving the school and was pleased to hear little voices singing Twinkle Twinkle, and sounds of the tap running. A few weeks later teachers of the grades 2 and 3 classes informed me the lesson had started the children talking with their families about the importance of food safety in the home.
 

Katie Filion is a soon-to-be graduate student at Kansas State University who currently resides in Doug and Amy's basement.

I’ve never been a fan of third-party audits.

As Ben and I wrote a few years ago,

“On-farm food safety cannot be just a set of formulaic guidelines; rather, it must be specific to an agricultural site to make it work, as suggested by Rangarajan et al (2002). A one-size-fits-all approach will not work, as the individual producer has many different priorities at any given time during the growing season. Participation of stakeholders has been identified as a missing component in all reviewed programmes. Further, third-party audits are an incomplete form of verification that provide a limited view of a producer’s facilities and documentation but do not effectively reduce risk. Audits are analagous to restaurant inspections, a snapshot of a business’s operating procedures and a visual inspection of facilities. It has been suggested that inspection scores for restaurants are subject to inspector inconsistencies and are not  predictive of the likelihood of an outbreak (Cruz et al, 2001; Jones et al 2004). This is likely to be true for producer third-party audits as well.”

At some point, folks will figure out that all these outbreaks of foodborne illness – like Salmonella in peanut butter – happened at places that passed so-called independent audits.

As Abraham Mahshie of The Packer wrote last week,

Increasingly, industry officials are calling for a regulatory benchmark that would create science-based food safety standards for third-party auditors. The result, they say, will be a sharp reduction in the cost of third-party audits that are at times repetitive and arbitrary measures of food safety.

“To me, the real issue in the certification, validation, etc. is there is no real scientific basis,” said Robert Buchanan, director of the Center for Food Systems Safety & Security, College Park, Md. “It hasn’t really been worked out to say, ‘these are the key steps that need to be controlled, or need to be achieved.’” …

He said that global GAP certifications, for example, in his opinion do not certify products for safety. … Buchanan said, in many cases, the third-party auditors are not transparent enough for the scientific community to survey and critically analyze what they are actually measuring.

I said that 10 years ago.

Paul Medeiros, food safety consulting manager for Guelph Food Technology Centre, Guelph, Ontario, said in Canada, many growers and government officials are debating how the standards for food safety should be set and who should provide the oversight once standards are in place.

That may keep a bunch of government and grower-types employed – does nothing for food safety.

Focus on what is going to result in fewer sick people.

Powell DA and Chapman BJ: Fresh Threat: What's lurking in your salad bowl? J Sci Food Agric 87:1799 – 1801 (2007)

KETV in Omaha is reporting that Girl Scout cookies are safe to eat -- the peanut butter products that are used to make them are not produced by Peanut Corp of America:

The peanut butter supplier associated with the recent salmonella outbreak does not supply peanut butter to Girl Scout Cookies, according to the Girl Scouts organization.

The Girl Scout organization's supplier is Hampton Farms in North Carolina.

In the somewhat-related-to-food-safety category, a man who helped create the science behind the microwave oven has died. Robert Decareau of Amherst, NH passed away on Sunday at 82.

According to his family, Decareau was a Massachusetts native who went to work for Raytheon after earning his doctorate in chemistry. It was there that he started working on microwave energy food applications, and he was one of the first to call himself a food scientist.

Decareau's daughter, Karen Ross of Auburn, Maine, says she remembers her father experimenting with a refrigerator-sized prototype microwave oven in the family's basement in the 1960s.

Frozen, raw or partially cooked foods have been problematic for consumers -- especially when they contain pathogens.  There have been at least eight outbreaks linked to, as Doug likes to call them, chicken thingies since 1998.  Using a microwave has been reported as a factor in these outbreaks. Pot pies have also been linked to microwave problems. Uneven heat distribution makes microwaving a not-so-good method to cook raw foods especially if digital tip-sensitive thermometers aren't used.  Sarah DeDonder presented some of our research at IAFP last year on microwave cooking practices in a model kitchen. A paper on the research will be published later this year.

Dedonder, S., Powell, D.A., Jacob, C., Surgeoner, B., Chapman, B., and Phebus, R. 2008. Beyond Intent -- Direct Observation Of Meal Preparation Procedures In A Home Kitchen Setting.

Abstract

Purpose – This study used a novel video capture system to observe the food preparation practices of 41 consumers – 21 primary meal preparers and 20 adolescents – in a mock domestic kitchen using uncooked, frozen, breaded chicken products, and to determine if differences exist between consumers’ reported safe food handling practices and actual food handling behavior as prescribed on current product labels.

Design/methodology/approach – A convenience sample was utilized and all participants were video-recorded preparing food in one-of-two model kitchens at Kansas State University. Participants were asked to complete a survey reporting food handling behaviors that would be typical of their own home kitchen.

Findings – Differences between self-reported and observed food safety behaviors were seen across both groups of consumers. Many participants reported owning a food thermometer (73 per cent) and indicated using one when cooking raw, breaded chicken entrées (19.5 per cent); however, only five participants were observed measuring the final internal temperature with a food thermometer despite instructions on the product packaging to do so; only three used the thermometer correctly.

Significance – Data collected through direct observation more accurately reflects consumer food handling behaviors than data collected through self-reported surveys, and label instructions are rarely followed.

Originality/value – This study contributes to the overall understanding of consumer behaviors associated with consumers’ intentions and actual behaviors while preparing meat and poultry products, such as frozen, uncooked, breaded chicken products.

Elizabeth Weise of USA Today writes that foods masquerading as something else — a more nutritious something else — have been big news in the past two years.

Chinese food companies in particular have been blamed for making deadly alterations to dairy, baby and pet foods by adding melamine. The chemical makes it appear that the food or beverage has the required level of protein.

But what about food producers in this country? What fraudulent foods do U.S. consumers have to fear from American companies?

Seafood
Fish is the most frequently faked food Americans buy. In the business, it's called "species adulteration" — selling a cheaper fish such as pen-raised Atlantic salmon as wild Alaska salmon.

Olive oil
This luxury oil, touted for its heart-health properties and taste, has become a gourmet must-have. Americans consumed about 575 million pounds of the silky stuff last year, according to the North American Olive Oil Association. Sixty-three percent was the higher-grade extra virgin, which comes from the first pressing of the olives. It's also one of the most frequently counterfeited food products, says Martin Stutsman, the FDA's consumer safety officer for edible oils.

Honey
An expensive natural product that's mostly sugar, honey is easily faked. "If you can substitute a less expensive source of sugar for the expensive one, you can save some money and gain market share," says the FDA's Stutsman.

Vanilla
A product of the tropics, vanilla pods can be soaked in milk or stored in sugar to impart a delicate vanilla scent to foods. More commonly, they're soaked in alcohol that is then used as a flavoring.

Maple syrup
Maple syrup is another high-value item that can be adulterated. In these tough economic times, Vermont, the USA's largest supplier to flapjacks everywhere, may up its testing programs.

But Quebec is the world’s largest producer of maple syrup. And I am not from Quebec.
 

The New York Times reported yesterday that the Internet has made it much easier to connect for sexual hookups. In response, public health officials have been exploring ways to harness the online world for conducting safe-sex education and preventing the spread of sexually transmitted diseases by alerting people exposed to them.

The e-card, which allows the sender to select the disease involved and includes links to public health sites and services, is part of that strategy.

So when I read this morning that the European Food Safety Agency reported that food-poisoning cases are on the rise across the 27-nation bloc, I thought, why not e-cards to warn of foodborne illness.

e-cards: they’re not just for sexual hookups anymore.
 

Last month while visiting friends in Sudbury, Ontario, we ate at East Side Mario’s restaurant – I love the unlimited salad and breadsticks. Though I didn’t have any problems with my meal, a patron who ate lunch at the Lasalle boulevard restaurant Dec. 30 did, and voiced a complaint to the Sudbury District Health Unit, according to the Sudbury Star.

"The patron complained about employees coughing on food, improper employee hand washing and a lack of hot water. A visit by the health inspector the next day didn’t reveal any violations, but it was recommended the restaurant review food education and handling practices with its employees. After a follow-up inspection resulted in a charge for lack of sanitizer in the mechanical glass washer, vice-president of operations at East Side Mario’s decided to close the restaurant. Employees from East Side Mario’s head office were sent in to help the local site return to company standards.

Though charges for the Lasalle Boulevard restaurant were made public it’s not typical of health and safety infractions in the Sudbury district. Here people must phone and ask about any problems at a restaurant or food store and receive either a verbal or written report about inspection reports, closures and convictions, said Stacey Laforest, manager of the health unit's environmental division.

There are better ways to communicate restaurant inspection results than simply disclosing information to curious consumers who call in. Many health units in North America are making results available via websites, like the Toronto, Ontario website DineSafe (http://app.toronto.ca/food2/DineSafeMain); or mandatory posting of inspection score cards (in the form of letter, grade, color, or smiley-face schemes) near the entrance of premises. Increasing the availability and display of food safety information will raise overall awareness, and push food establishments to better themselves. The Greater Sudbury district could benefit from such disclosure methods. 
 

Katie Filion is a soon-to-be graduate student at Kansas State University who currently resides in Doug and Amy's basement.

The local grocery store where I earned minimum wage in my high school days closed down after I went off to college because it could no longer afford to compete with the Wal-Mart Supercenter in the next town.

I suppose confining the sale of expired goods to a single grocery cart at the front of the store really limited our earning potential.

Likewise, confining my ideas on the safety of out-of-date food to simple assumptions really limited my family’s money-saving potential. In my naivety, I assumed that dates on food referred to how long they were safe to eat.

This is not true.

Most dates provided by manufacturers on packages of food are just an indication of when the quality of the item will start to decline and—in the majority of cases—foods will remain safe past the date given.

This is why people are comfortable buying expired foods at discounted prices from online sellers in the UK and local groceries in Pennsylvania.

Many food safety authorities feel that pregnant women should be more careful than these buyers, though. Agencies in Europe, New Zealand, and Australia, each tell pregnant women to avoid food past their ‘use by’ dates protect themselves and their babies from harm.

I am certainly not the foremost authority on the diet of a pregnant woman. But in the words of my new favorite USDA FSIS fact sheet,

“‘Use-by’ dates usually refer to best quality and are not safety dates.”

I expect there are some Pittsburgh Steelers fans up preparing for a day of tailgating, even though the kick-off in the American Football Conference Championship game is not for another 12 hours.

Amy will be cheering for the underdog Baltimore Ravens, because back-up wide receiver and special teams specialist Yamon Figurs played ball at Kansas State.

Amy never really followed football, except for the band. I started taking her to Kansas State games, more for the spectacle than the sport, and Amy became a fan.

Those purchasing food at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh may want to be wary. Like tailgaters, perhaps people need to take their own digital, tip-sensitive thermometer.

ThePittsburghChannel.Com reports that three-quarters of all food vendors at the stadium have been cited for critical violations in the past two years.

“Inspectors cited the Steel City Grill for serving chicken, chipped beef and hot dogs as much as 40 degrees below the required temperature. …

“The Steel City Grill was cited for serving meat at lukewarm temperatures in 2007 and again in 2008.

The 2008 inspection also said the "cook does not know the proper cooking temperature for chicken."

As far as K-State football alumni in the three years I’ve been in Kansas, I prefer Zac Diles, who now plays for the Houston Texans. Unassuming, hard-hitting linebacker at Kansas State, just like I was in my own mind back in high school. We even wore the same number – #52.
 

In another example of, know thy suppliers, whether it’s around the corner or around the globe, Kellogg’s has announced its peanut butter cracker thingies – which are sorta gross -- are on hold, including all Keebler and Austin brand crackers, as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control announced that 453 are sick and at least five, possibly six are dead from Salmonella in peanut butter.

Yesterday the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced it notified anywhere from 30-85 companies that bought peanut butter or peanut paste from a Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) processing facility in Blakely, Georgia to test their products.

Stephen Sundlof, director of the Food and Drug Administration’s food safety center, said,

“This is a very active investigation, but we don’t yet have the data to provide consumers with specifics about what brands or products they should avoid.”

Laboratory tests by the Georgia Department of Agriculture have confirmed Salmonella contamination in some peanut butter manufactured by the PCA plant in Blakey, as have tests by health officials in Connecticut.

Connecticut’s Consumer Protection Commissioner Jerry Farrell, Jr. said,

“This is the first unopened tub of King Nut peanut butter found in the country that is definitively identified as being tainted with salmonella. My office just received the results from the Connecticut Department of Public Health Laboratory confirming the presence of Salmonella Type B in an unopened tub.  This provides further evidence that some lots of King Nut brand peanut butter delivered to food service accounts are responsible for a recent outbreak of salmonella infections in consumers.”
 

Amy is a merciless editor.

Sure, she looks all sugar and spice, cuddling with baby Sorenne (right, exactly as shown), but when it comes to words, Amy’s vicious.

I know Ben cries – silently, inside -- whenever he gets edits from Amy.

I tried to get Kansas State public relations to do a press release about the husband and wife barfbloggers, but they weren’t going for it.

Instead, they came out with this after we wrote a paper about our blogging experiences that was just published in the Jan. 2009 issue of Food Technology, the monthly magazine of the Institute of Food Technologists (the full paper is below).

K-State's Doug Powell, associate professor of diagnostic medicine and
pathobiology, is a co-author of the article "New Media for Communicating Food Safety.” In the article, Powell and the other researchers describe how methods of informing consumers must evolve to fit a new generation of food handlers.

"It is especially important to reach younger individuals, who at some point might handle food in a food service business and who get their information from nontraditional media like blogs," he said.

One such blog is Powell's barfblog.com, a site that receives more than 5,000 visitors daily. The site operates with the understanding that to compel audiences to change their food-handling behaviors, the messages should be rapid, reliable, relevant and repeated, Powell said. The blog is available at http://www.barfblog.com

The content combines pop culture references and current events with food-handling information to engage readers. The posts also combine food safety messages with personal experiences, which connect readers to the effects of foodborne illness on families and communities, he said.

"Up to 30 percent of all Americans will get sick from the food and water they consume each year. That's just way too many sick people," Powell said. "The site is all about providing information in a compelling manner, using pop culture and different languages, to ultimately have fewer sick people."

The other authors of the article include: Amy Hubbell, K-State assistant professor of modern languages; Casey Jacob, K-State research assistant in diagnostic medicine and pathobiology; and Benjamin Chapman, food safety extension specialist at North Carolina State University.

barfblog.foodsafety.ksu.edu/uploads/file/powell_newmedia.pdf

I have no use for food porn.

I have less use for alleged food celebrities who cross-contaminate everything they touch and don’t know shit about how to determine if they’ve cooked the shit out of their meat.

Use a digital, tip-sensitive thermometer next time.
 

What with baby Sorenne, and the breastfeeding, and my general attitude, there’s been a lot of nakedness around the house lately.

However, with student Katie arriving tomorrow from Canada to take up residence in the basement, time to be more discreet.

Unlike the dude in Australia’s Northern Territory who was served hot chips (right, exactly as shown) at a Territory eatery wearing … nothing.

The late night reveller stripped bare before putting in his order at the Darwin City 24-Hour Eatery on Smith St early on Monday.

A witness said the naked man walked into the shop to order two buckets of chips with gravy.

And the female attendant was reportedly only too happy to serve the nude customer.
 

King Nut is evidently done talking about peanut butter.

Following a comprehensive recall by Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) of 21 lots of its peanut butter—including the King Nut product found by the Minnesota Departments of Health and Agriculture to contain a strain of Salmonella genetically identical to that found in over 425 sick people across the nation—King Nut deferred all further questions about the outbreak to PCA.

Clamming up is not good risk communication.



However, after a couple unfounded claims, it may be wiser that King Nut stop talking.

King Nut’s last statement to the press was a letter from President and CEO Martin Kanan refuting the suggestion that contaminated King Nut peanut butter could have caused people in 43 different states to become sick.

Kanan argued, in bold font,

“We only distribute in seven states and therefore King Nut peanut butter could not possibly be the source of a nationwide outbreak of salmonella. (King Nut peanut butter is distributed to food service companies in Ohio, Minnesota, Michigan, North Dakota, Arizona, Idaho and New Hampshire.)”

Really? It couldn’t possibly? How do you know?

Do you track the consumption of all the peanut butter you distribute? Many states with sick people share borders with those seven states, don’t they? Maybe it’s not probable that all 425 people were sickened by King Nut peanut butter, but it’s still possible.

It’s a better idea to talk intelligently about those small possibilities than to make big claims that can’t really be proven.



Another silly claim I noticed was found upon closer inspection of the January 10 press release. There, I realized Kanan did say “sorry” once. But he also said,

“All other King Nut products are safe and not included in this voluntary recall.”

Really? They’re all safe? How do you know?

Do you have data? The pinky promise (i.e. certificate of safety) PCA gave you didn’t seem to hold up, so why should we believe you?

Talking about the possible risks—however minute—is the only way to gain the trust of an intelligent public. Pushing unfounded beliefs or assumptions onto society is just one effective way to create chaos.

Just ask the South Koreans.
 

Any cases of E. coli O157:H7 are "heart-wrenching.”

That’s what Tanya Maksymic, whose daughter Julia became seriously sick with E. coli in 2007, told the Calgary Herald after hearing that public health types are investigating a cluster of five cases in Calgary, which appear related to additional cases in Edmonton and Saskatchewan.

Dr. Richard Musto, Calgary medical officer of health for Alberta Health Services, said,

"We think we see some patterns here. It's still early, but it looks like there is some . . . connection between these cases."

Two of the people required hospitalization, according to sources, who added the Calgary cases appear linked to three unnamed Vietnamese restaurants. …

In the latest cases, the seven people fell ill between Nov. 26 and Jan. 2.

Maksymic went on to add,

"I never let my guard down, I'm always taking extra precautions. You don't live normally after that (experience)."
 

In a fantastic combination of celebrity and food porn, the Globe and Mail reports on U.S. President-elect Obama's favorite foods -- sort of.

There was a lot of guessing that went into this hard-hitting investigative journalism:

Early last year, when the Obamas said pizza from Italian Fiesta Pizzeria in Chicago was their favourite, co-owner Patti Harris-Tubbs says people called her up to say, "I'll have whatever Obama likes." But Ms. Harris-Tubbs isn't sure which pie that is.

"Our most popular is cheese and sausage," she tells them. "I guess I would have to go with that."

Eddie Gehman Kohan, the Los Angeles freelance writer behind the Obama Foodorama blog, says she doesn't know, either.

She points to a New York Times interview with Reggie Love, Mr. Obama's right-hand man, who was quoted as saying the boss's favourite foods are Dentyne Ice, Nicorette, pistachios and MET-Rx chocolate-roasted peanut protein bars.

"Part of the fascination with food is trying to pinpoint who is he? How can we define him, how can we understand him?" Ms. Gehman Kohan says.

One thing the food paparazzi does know is that Obama likes his hot sauce. Ms. Gehman Kohan was cited as saying, "He puts it on everything, he carries a bottle with him.He's shown he can handle the heat. At least so far."

Here's a nice clip of food critic Barack from a 2001 local TV food show in Chicago. 

In the early 1990s, I worked with a guy who said, “When I retire, I’m going to have a front porch with a couple of huge amps, my electric guitar, play Jimi Hendrix, and do a lot of hallucinogens.”

But I recall he drank a lot of coffee. And researchers at Durham University in the U.K. announced yesterday in the journal, Personality and Individual Differences, that high caffeine consumption could be linked to a greater tendency to hallucinate.

People with a higher caffeine intake, from sources such as coffee, tea and caffeinated energy drinks, are more likely to report hallucinatory experiences such as hearing voices and seeing things that are not there, according to the Durham University study.

'High caffeine users' – those who consumed more than the equivalent of seven cups of instant coffee a day - were three times more likely to have heard a person's voice when there was no one there compared with 'low caffeine users' who consumed less than the equivalent of one cup of instant coffee a day.

In the study, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Medical Research Council, 200 students were asked about their typical intake of caffeine containing products, such as coffee, tea and energy drinks as well as chocolate bars and caffeine tablets. Their proneness to hallucinatory experiences, and their stress levels, were also assessed. Seeing things that were not there, hearing voices, and sensing the presence of dead people were amongst the experiences reported by some of the participants.

Maybe people who do a lot of acid or ‘shrooms drink a lot of coffee and eat a bunch of chocolate.

When I was 17-years-old, my friend Dave and I hitchhiked to Grand Bend, Ontario, on Lake Huron, to go camping for a few days.

A camping neighbor went into town and bought us four cases of beer – for a fee. We asked for Pleasure Packs – Molson Canadian and Export – and he came back with something else. It contained a beer called 50. Horrible, horrible beer.

But we drank it.

I won’t go into all the sordid details – girlfriends visiting and not being happy, sleeping with the American girls, the dead raccoon – but we got kicked out of the park and then rechecked in under another name.

Did I mention the dead raccoon?

We didn’t eat it.

But I didn’t know about Missouri back then.

The Kansas City Star reported this morning,

He rolls into the parking lot of Leon's Thriftway in an old, maroon Impala with a trunk full of frozen meat. Raccoon — the other dark meat.

In five minutes, Montrose, Mo., trapper Larry Brownsberger is sold out in the lot at 39th Street and Kensington Avenue. Word has gotten around about how clean his frozen raccoon carcasses are. How nicely they’re tucked up in their brown butcher paper. How they almost look like a trussed turkey … or something.

Seriously, Dave and I drove a 1972 Impala to Grand Bend.

Raccoons go for $3 to $7 — each, not per pound — and will feed about five adults. Four, if they’re really hungry.

Those who dine on raccoon meat sound the same refrain: It's good eatin'. …

The meat isn’t USDA-inspected, and few state regulations apply, same as with deer and other game. No laws prevent trappers from selling raccoon carcasses.

In May 2008, the Baltimore Health Department proposed the Clean Crab award, the image of a meticulous crab, hung perhaps at a restaurant's threshold, to alert people to Baltimore's cleanest dining establishments.

Yesterday, health types decided to cleanse themselves of crabs.

Instead, the Baltimore Examiner reports, a prize ribbon decal will recognize those with a solid record of sanitation for the Charm City Health Award for Excellence in Sanitation.

Olivia Farrow, assistant commissioner of the environmental health division of the Baltimore City Health Department, said,

"[The crab] is a bottom-feeder, so it's probably not a good image."
 

Kansas? Why would you go to Kansas?

That’s the question I repeatedly received back in 2006 when I officially made the move. Sure, Amy was a great draw, but the lack of a hockey arena and the distance to the airport were significant detriments.

The community, both at Kansas State University and Manhattan, was fairly inviting. They’re not sure what to make of me walking around with a baby strapped to my belly, but every place has its quirks.

I just wanted to be in an environment where I could give 110 per cent, cause there’s no I in team. I just wanted to be someplace where I could do my thing.

So when the U.S. Department of Homeland Security finalized its decision today to approve a site at Kansas State University for a $450 million lab to study livestock diseases and some of the world's most dangerous biological threats, I wasn’t surprised.

DHS released its final record of the approval Monday, confirming a decision announced in December to build the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility at the Manhattan, Kan., campus to replace an aging lab at Plum Island, N.Y.

Ralph Richardson, dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Kansas State (right), told USA Today today that the lab can be operated safely.

"This country is in great need of a modern laboratory for animal diseases.”

And Manhattan (Kansas) is the best place for it.
 

In May 2008, thousands of South Koreans took to the streets to protest the impending importation of U.S. beef. In a classic example of the social amplification of risk theory, citizens were apparently convinced that substandard beef was headed for South Korea and they would all develop mad cow disease.

Now, some citizens are fighting back.

JoonAng Daily reports that more than 1,000 Korean-Americans filed a group lawsuit against a Korean broadcaster yesterday, claiming its coverage of the supposed health risks of U.S. beef humiliated them and subjected them to mockery in the United States.

In April last year, Seoul-based MBC broadcast a report on U.S. beef warning that consumption of the meat may lead to the human form of mad cow disease. Following the airing of the “PD Diary” episode, tens of thousands of South Koreans took to the streets to protest a Seoul-Washington agreement that reopened the Korean beef market to U.S. products.

The protests continued for months, rattling the new Lee Myung-bak administration. …

“We demand that MBC and the chief producer of PD Diary pay for the psychological damage and broadcast a correction report and an apology,” said Lee Heon, legal representative of the group. …

Lee said the plaintiffs were insulted by PD Diary as its report insinuated that anyone who eats U.S. beef will contract the human form of mad cow disease. He also argued that because of the report, people living in Korea came to look down on overseas Koreans who have eaten U.S. beef for years.

And every time I hear of some frivolous story about mad cow disease – not the serious stories where innocent people die – I think of this 1995 song by Vancouver band, The Odds.
 

Judy Foreman of The Boston Globe says the U.S. Department of Agriculture recommends no matter how frozen chicken is cooked, from whatever kind of meal or chicken thingies, use a thermometer to ensure the internal temperature has reached 165 degrees Fahrenheit.

Good advice.

So why at the end of the brief article is Roger Fielding, a professor of nutrition at Tufts University, quoted as saying, "Always cut it open and make sure it is white, not pink or translucent. You really have to be careful."

Bad advice.

What you really have to be careful about is taking food safety advice from nutrition professors at Tufts University.

Color is a lousy indicator. Use a digital, tip-sensitive thermometer.

I’m always open to trying new foods, but I don’t know if I’m all that interested in eating squirrel.  Sure they’re terribly cute with their little hands and bright eyes, but I can’t help but wonder what kinds of diseases they carry.  In terms of food I’ve always thought squirrel was more of a roadkill dish.

The Brtis sure don’t agree with my opinion of the squirrel.  There is a booming industry for squirrel meat in the UK, and the public cannot get enough of it.  In farmers’ markets, butcher shops, village pubs and elegant restaurants, squirrel is selling as fast as gamekeepers and hunters can bring it in.  It’s not just a matter of eating something trendy, culling squirrels has become a necessity with the red squirrel population being pushed out by the gray squirrels.

“The situation is more than simply a matter of having too many squirrels. In fact, there is a war raging in Squirreltown: invading interlopers (gray squirrels introduced from North America over the past century or more) are crowding out a British icon, the indigenous red squirrel immortalized by Beatrix Potter and cherished by generations since. The grays take over the reds’ habitat, eat voraciously and harbor a virus named squirrel parapox (harmless to humans) that does not harm grays but can devastate reds. (Reports indicate, though, that the reds are developing resistance.)

The “Save Our Squirrels” campaign began in 2006 to rescue Britain’s red squirrels by piquing the nation’s appetite for their marauding North American cousins. With a rallying motto of “Save a red, eat a gray!” the campaign created a market for culled squirrel meat.”

Though squirrel has been promoted as a low-fat food, discrepancies have been found in meat quality.  Nichola Fletcher, a food writer and co-owner of a venison farm, said that in her experience, “the quality and amount of fat varied from no visible fat to about 30 percent, depending on the season, their age and, especially, diet.”  I guess there’s no USDA grading system for squirrels. Though there don’t seem to be written standards in preparing a squirrel dish, food safety standards, such as handwashing and cooking meat thoroughly, should always be a top priority when preparing a meal.

“If you want to grab your shotgun, make sure you have very good aim — squirrels must be shot in the head; a body shot renders them impossible to skin or eat. (You want to get rid of the head in any event, as squirrel brains have been linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human form of mad cow disease.)”

For those interested in trying squirrel, recipes can be found here and here.

I don’t like peanut butter. Never have. Hate’s a strong word, but I hate peanut butter. Just another food I don’t like – like sprouts and green onions -- that will reduce my risk of contracting foodborne illness.

And if I was institutionalized, the last thing I would want is peanut butter. Unless I was really old or pregnant, then I wouldn’t want deli meats either (that listeria thing).

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control, which is apparently getting a new boss, reported Friday that 399 persons have become infected with the same outbreak strain of Salmonella Typhimurium in 42 states. And, as the startribune.com of Minnesota reports, Minnesota disease investigators once again may have solved the riddle of a nation-wide salmonella outbreak. This time the culprit is peanut butter.

Kirk Smith, supervisor of foodborne diseases at the state health department, said that the clue in this outbreak was that many of the Minnesotans who became ill had eaten in institutional settings. That included nursing homes, schools, and colleges, he said.

"What they had in common was this brand of peanut butter," he said. "That was enough."

Officials from the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) and the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) issued a product advisory after MDA’s preliminary laboratory testing indicated the presence of Salmonella bacteria in a 5-pound container of King Nut brand creamy peanut butter.

I want to say I work for King Nut. Or the other way around. But until that link is firmed up, here’s an op-ed from the last peanut butter outbreak two years ago, involving ConAgra’s Peter Pan brand peanut butter, which was eventually linked to at least 625 salmonella cases in 47 states. I hate peanut butter as much as jazz (see video below).

PB & J, the new spinach
Feb. 16/07

Contrary to the protestations of Shaquille O'Neal during a game of Scattergories on Curb Your Enthusiasm, peanut butter is not often thought of as a dairy product (peanut BUT-TER he winks at Larry David).

Peanut butter is also not often thought of as a source of salmonella.

As Katie Kuba, 23, said yesterday while shopping in Dorchester, MA, "It’s alarming that it’s something like peanut butter. You wouldn’t think peanut butter, it’s mostly spinach."

As Americans sort through their pantries to see if Peter Pan or Great Value is amongst the three-or-four half-empty jars of peanut butter most families maintain, many, including the almost 300 confirmed sick, may be wondering, how does salmonella get into peanut butter?

Salmonella commonly originates in the feces of birds and animals, and could be introduced at numerous points in the peanut butter-making process, but are normally killed during the peanut roasting process, and again with heat during the production of peanut butter.

But it has happened before.

Beginning in April 1996, some 500 people across Australia were stricken with Salmonella that had made its way into peanut butter.

At first, investigators focused on chicken; that chickens carry Salmonella has been worn into the public's food safety conscious for decades. But as cases of Salmonella increased across the country and after questioning the sick and the vomiting, an unlikely food source emerged: peanut butter.

In the 1996 Australia outbreak, researchers first found the same genetic stain of Salmonella in peanut butter from the homes of some of the sick (unlike fresh produce, the long shelf-life of peanut butter provides an advantage for disease detectives). Because the manufacturer retained samples for shelf-life tests, the peanut butter was found to contain the same strain of Salmonella, as did the roasted peanuts from a single supplier.

After six months of investigation, Australian researchers came up with a theory: the roasting company had moved and separated the roasted peanuts with an auger, a drill-like machine with a spiraling blade that could lift piles of peanuts, that had been contaminated with mouse feces.

Peter Wood, senior lecturer in microbiology at Queensland, University of Technology, Brisbane, was quoted as telling the American Society of Microbiology in 1999 that, "The auger was only used four times because it proved not to be as time-saving as first thought," and the machine had been kept in the company tool yard. During that time, eastern Australia was in the throes of a plague of mice. The rodents nested everywhere, including the tool yard, where their droppings contaminated the auger. When the auger was brought in to the plant, it was washed down but Wood said it was not sanitized before it was used on Jan. 10, 1996. Salmonella from the auger mixed with the peanuts, and contaminated the system.

Salmonella is commonly associated with the feces of birds and animals, has been found to survive in soil in almond orchards, and could be introduced at a multitude of stages in the peanut butter-making process. Although processing normally eliminates contamination, several studies following the 1996 Australian outbreak have revealed that the high fat content of peanut butter can actually protect individual bacteria during the heating process.

Similarly, in 2006, Cadbury in the U.K. recalled 1 million candy bars after tentative links with Salmonella cases stretching over 6 months. A leaky pipe in the production facility may have been the cause. Maintenance and sanitation, two departments integral in food safety system success, appear to have failed in both outbreaks.

An estimated 974 million pounds of peanut butter is sold each year and a jar of peanut butter is sold every second in the U.S. From carrot juice to spinach to tomatoes, the sources of foodborne illness continue to surprise. The best prevention is constant vigilance.

Chuck Dodd, a veterinarian and PhD student at Kansas State University, writes:

I grew up in rural Missouri eating meat and potatoes, mostly meat, and quite a bit of it.

But my carnivorous mantra doesn’t match the advice of Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food—An Eaters Manifesto (right). He says:

“Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.”

Most of the world already follows Michael Pollan’s advice—out of necessity.

Approximately 4.7 billion people, or over two-thirds of the world’s population, live in lower income countries where safe food and water is limited. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) now reports that rising food prices have contributed to a global increase in malnourishment and hunger. For people living in areas of poverty or conflict, it isn’t about food choices, it’s about simply eating. My wife, Lisa (with neighbor, left), and I lived among the poor in East Africa for six years. We’ve seen hunger, malnourishment, and the effects of diarrheal disease in children--not from the safe distance of a TV screen, but among our friends.  We strived to help transform lives in difficult places.       

Many of us who live in affluent societies enjoy abundant food choices. In the U.S., we have the luxury of being able to pick our diet based upon personal preference, individual nutrients, food production systems, origin, brand, and price. For those of us who have these abundant food choices, Pollan provides additional advice:

???don’t eat anything that your great grand-mother wouldn’t recognize as food;

???avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable, c) more than five in number, or that include d) high-fructose corn syrup;

???avoid food products that make health claims;

???shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle. (processed food products dominate the center aisles); and,

???get out of the supermarket whenever possible.

Pollan’s recommendations are clever. But some of his other recommendations, like “pay more, eat less,” would offend our African friends, like Olendorrop (right).  Olendorrop faces daily challenges in feeding his family.  In the semi-arid savannah of the Rift Valley in northern Tanzania, he struggles to raise sheep and goats, grow corn, and survive.  He has learned how to use dewormers to keep his livestock healthy.  When he uses an antibiotic to treat a sick animal, he doesn’t care about organic food.  All of his animals are grass-fed because corn is people food.  He can’t go to the supermarket because there isn’t one.  He isn’t worried about health claims and ingredients because his food doesn’t have labels.  If Olendorrop paid more and ate less, his family wouldn’t survive.

My advice: if you can afford to choose what you eat, be thankful. Being able to consider what you eat is a luxury in itself. 

Our eater’s manifesto should be to help others simply eat.  Have we, the affluent with abundant food choices, finally arrived, or have we lost touch with global reality?  Do we really need to defend our food from food science and food production systems, as Pollan writes, or do we need to defend the 923 million undernourished people in the world  who don’t have food and help transform their lives?

Real Genius was a 1985 fluff film notable for some witty banter, bunny slippers, and that actor Val Kilmer, in the role of science whiz Chris Knight, once had a sense of humor. Like this scene, right:

Dr. Dodd: Why is that toy on your head?
Chris Knight: Because if I wear it any place else, it chafes.

And I wish I’d remembered this classic when Amy was pregnant