Food Poisoning, Foodborne Illness Information and Research : International Food Safety Network : BarfBlog

That’s what dietician and TV personality Leslie Beck asked yesterday in the Toronto Globe and Mail as she posed a pre-Canadian-Thanksgiving food safety quiz.

Leslie (right) didn’t do so good -- and she’s the alleged teacher with the answer book.

That’s because she went to the Coles Notes version -- the Canadian Partnership for Consumer Food Safety Education – for her answers instead of doing some digging.

“While food processing has been blamed for many of these (foodborne) outbreaks, the fact remains that the majority of food-safety problems occur at home. It is estimated that Canada has as many as 13 million cases of food poisoning every year, most of which could be prevented by safer handling of food at home.”

With at least 20 people dead from listeria in cold cuts in Canada, such a statement is not only factually inaccurate, it is condescendingly harsh.

“Fresh produce must always be washed - true or false?
Answer: True
Fresh fruit and vegetables should never be consumed without being washed under clean, running water - even prebagged, prewashed produce.”

Chirstine Bruhn, UC Davis, do you have something to add on this? Last I saw, scientists were saying don’t rewash the pre-washed greens for fear of contaminating clean product. Food safety is not simple and there are lots of disagreements – which is why these laundry lists of do’s and don’t’s, are fairly useless. People are interested in this stuff, give them some data, some information, some context, not just questionable marching orders.

“What temperature does your stuffed Thanksgiving turkey need to reach before it is safe to eat?
Answer: d) 82 C (180 F)
Use a digital meat thermometer and cook your turkey until the temperature at the thickest part of the breast or thigh is at least 82 C (180 F)."

No idea where this comes from, because Health Canada won’t let mere mortals peek at the wizard behind the green curtain who makes such pronouncements (watch the video below for how Health Canada derives at consumer recommendations for things like cooking temperatures). The recommended internal temperature in the U.S. is 165F. You can read how that number was determined at http://barfblog.foodsafety.ksu.edu/2007/10/articles/food-safety-communication/thawing-and-cooking-turkey/.

Both are better than the U.K.’s, “piping hot.”

“What is the safest way to thaw your Thanksgiving turkey?
Answer: d) In the fridge
 Never defrost a turkey at room temperature.”

Yes you can, and I will be this weekend. Check out Pete Snyder’s comments and our own work in this area.

We’ll be videotaping the turkey preparation for our annual Canadian-expat-in-Manhattan (Kansas) Thanksgiving feast on Monday.
 

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Here's today's festive infosheets, consider it a holiday gift to all of our faithful barfblog readers. Our focus today was on a few things that you might encounter during the holidays, especially at family or work parties. And the picture of Santa is pretty awesome.

You can download the infosheet here.

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The Brits apparently don't like data when it comes to cooking hamburgers, and now, turkey.

Same with the Irish.

 For the home cook, the data is the tip-sensitive digital thermometer, and a recording of 160F for hamburgers, 165F for poultry.

For the U.K.'s Food Standards Agency, it's, "check it's piping hot all the way through."

I have no idea what that means.

When I hear piping hot, I think of Dick van Dyke in Mary Poppins.

Seriously, the best the taxpayer-funded FSA can come up with is:

So make sure your turkey is cooked properly:
    * check it's piping hot all the way through
    * cut into the thickest part to check that none of the meat is pink
    * if juices run out, they should be clear.

Wow.

One of the great things about the barfblog software provided by food safety dude Bill Marler is that we can see what people are searching for. Since Thanksgiving, people are repeatedly searching for, "Where to place a thermometer in a turkey."

So, not only are they using a thermometer, they want to know how to do it properly.

Don't ask the U.K.'s  Food Standards Agency.

Or Ireland's safefood, which yesterday said it's safe to cook stuffing inside the turkey and,

"remember, always make sure your cooked turkey is piping hot all the way through, with no pink meat, and all the juices run clear."

But here are some tips. And some pics from our Thanksgiving turkey.

Food safety guru Pete Snyder says,

If you have stuffed the turkey, you must cook the stuffed bird until the stuffing is above 150F. This assures a 10,000,000-to-1 kill of Salmonella. At this point, the breast will probably be 165F, which is very safe, and the thigh will be about 185F, which is necessary to make this muscle tissue soft.

Sara Moulton on ABC's Good Morning America says:

The thermometer goes into the thickest part of the thigh and should not touch the bone.

The U.S. National Turkey Federation says to insert the thermometer 2 1/2 inches in the deepest portion of the turkey breast or into the inner thigh near the breast. Make sure the thermometer does not touch a bone. When inserting the thermometer in the turkey breast, insert it from the side. The thermometer is easier to read and more accurate than when inserted from the top.

And the U.S. Department of Agriculture says for whole turkeys, place the thermometer in the thickest part of the inner thigh. Once the thigh has reached 165 °F, check the wing and the thickest part of the breast to ensure the turkey has reached a safe minimum internal temperature of 165 °F throughout the product.

The Brits are right to say that people shouldn’t wash their turkeys before cooking them -- a cross contamination nightmare -- but why they refuse to advocate tip-sensitive digital thermometers is baffling. And risky.

And these are happy people not barfing because I used a tip-sensitive digital meat thermometer, and didn't rely on "piping hot."

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"One year the turkey took a long time to cook and I went to carve it after about 13 beers. The way I remember it, I bore down to take off the leg and the whole thing went shooting off the platter and knocked over the centerpiece."

That's Maurice Landry, who lives near Lake Charles, La., telling the N.Y. Times about his worst turkey carving experience -- at least the one he can partially remember.

Forget the Father Knows Best approach with the big bird gracefully carved and doled out to the appreciative -- or glassy-eyed -- guests.

Ray Venezia, the meat director for the four Fairway markets, a third-generation butcher and one of the biggest turkey purveyors in New York City, carves turkey the same way I do.

"I don’t cut like a chef, I cut like a butcher."

Instead of slicing the meat from the roast at the table, Mr. Venezia’s carving protocol calls for the biggest pieces, the breasts and the thighs, to be removed whole, then boned and sliced on a cutting board. “Trying to carve from the carcass is like trying to cut it off a beach ball: it’s all curved surfaces and it moves around under the knife,” he said. “Give me a flat cutting board any time.”

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A previous post generated several responses, but this is too big to post as a response.
So it's a blog post on its own.

I have been asking Health Canada politely for a decade how they determine consumer recommendations for preparing poultry. What is the best way to thaw poultry? How do they determine the safe end-point internal temperature? What references do they use? (This discussion, like the original Health Canada press release, is specific to consumer practices in the home, not in food service).

I've never received an answer.

So when Health Canada issues press releases saying consumers should do this and not do this, I wonder, what is that based on?

In the U.S. in 2006, the recommended end-point cooking temperature for all poultry was lowered to 165F from the previous 180F. This was based on recommendations by the National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Criteria for Foods. Where the 180F recommendation came from , no one really knows. Diane Van, manager of the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture Meat and Poultry Hotline, was quoted as saying in a Nov. 2006 L.A. Times story about the old 180F advice, "I've looked all over and I really have no idea. I think it happened sometime back in the 1980s, but I don't know what it was based on."

At least that's honest.

In Canada, the Health Canada recommendation for whole poultry is 185F. How was that temperature decided? Are there peer-reviewed journal articles that were used to develop that recommendation? Do bacteria behave differently north of the 49th parallel?

Health Canada says in its Canadian Thanksgiving press release that consumers should,

Use a food thermometer, and cook turkey until the temperature of the thickest part of the breast or thigh is at least 85ºC (185ºF).

A Health Canada press release dated June 21, 2007 says,

Traditional visual cues like colour are not a guarantee that food is safe. Don't guess! (Use) a digital instant-read food thermometer to check when meat and poultry are safe to eat.

Yet a search of the Health Canada website today brought up a suggested dinner recipe that says,

Hot and spicy! Cook boneless chicken strips in a skillet until juices run clear and meat is browned.

Given such inconsistencies, and the utter lack of accountability, why would consumers be expected to blindly follow what some governmental agency proclaims?

Twenty dollars is too much to view the thawing recommendatinos paper. It's below. I can e-mail it as an attachment if you contact me directly. I'll respond to the questions about staph in another post.

And in the Sunflower Bowl this afternoon, Kansas State (ranked 24, but not for long) lost to University of Kansas 30-24.

Lacroix BJ, Li KW, Powell DA. 2003. Consumer food handling recommendations: is thawing of turkey a food safety issue? Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research, 64(2): 59-61.

Comparison of findings for thawing turkey and consumer food handling recommendations: is thawing of turkey a food safety issue?   
Lacroix, B. J., Li, K.W.M. and Powell, D.A.
Abstract
While it is important that dietitians and other health or food professionals provide consistent messages to the public about food safety, it is equally important that the information be evidence-based. Conflicting recommendations are evident when both consumer publications from food safety advisory groups and the scientific literature are reviewed. In addition, there are caveats attached to the various methods. The presence of pathogens, spoilage microorganisms and contamination of the work area are the major concerns in thawing turkey. While several methods including thawing on the counter at ambient temperatures can be employed for thawing turkey, however, it is adequate cooking, validated with a meat thermometer, that is the more critical step. Based on these findings, it is difficult for food and health professionals to provide clients or consumers with clear, consistent, evidence-based messages.  Further research is required to corroborate best practices in a kitchen setting. This paper is of interest to professionals who counsel clients at high-risk for foodborne illness or consumers about safe preparation of foods such as turkey
 Comparison of findings for thawing turkey to consumer food handling recommendations: Is thawing of turkey a safety issue?
Introduction
Inadequate thawing of turkeys, coupled with undercooking was found to be an important factor in many salmonellosis outbreaks (1). Health Canada reports 10,000 - 30,000 actual cases annually of foodborne illness with an estimated number of two million (2, 3). Confounding these estimates is underreporting - acknowledged to be as many 100 unreported cases for each one reported (4). Because Canadians purportedly eat turkey more than once a month (5), there is the potential for mishandling. Canadians also vary in what is deemed safe: in a 1998 study (6), most (87%) thought that thawing turkey in the refrigerator was safe while 5% thought it unsafe and another 57% considered thawing at room temperature to be an unsafe practice while 29% considered it safe.
Pathogens, spoilage microorganisms and contamination of the food preparation area are the major food safety concerns.  There are six methods of thawing, each with it’s own caveat. (Due to space restrictions, not all methods are discussed).
The purpose of this report is to document inconsistencies in home thawing recommendations for turkey and refute the importance placed on these recommendations.
Food Safety Issues
Pathogenic microorganisms associated with turkey include salmonella, campylobacter, staphylococcus and Listeria (7); however, thorough cooking eliminates most pathogens (1).  While not expected to grow in raw turkey (1, 8, 9), staphylococcus when present is generally the consequence of handling by an infected person and illness results because heating will not destroy toxins produced (9). Clostridium perfringens may be of concern because spores, if present in the dressing can survive roasting temperatures and their outgrowth in mishandled stuffing and meat cause foodborne illness (10).
In 1968, the United States Department of Agriculture (11) concluded that ambient air temperature thawing was satisfactory as long as precautions were taken (which were not stated). Beneficial effects of insulating overwraps were also noted. Lee (1) recommended that smaller turkeys, 4.7 kg (10 lb), be thawed at room temperature 23-27ºC (73-80ºF) on the counter no more than 12 hours and a maximum of 18 hours for 11.9 kg (26 lb) turkeys. Even better results were achieved when turkeys were wrapped in 8 sheets of newspaper for 18-20 hours on the counter. The Argentinean experience concluded that thawing chickens at ambient temperatures of 22ºC (72ºF) for 14 hours or less (to an internal temperature of 4.4ºC/40ºF, 3.5 cm/11/3 in. within the breast) was a safe procedure (12).
A longer time is required to thaw turkeys in the refrigerator where the temperatures may vary (12). Consequently, growth of pseudomonas spoilage bacteria (12) causing changes in odour, texture, colour and sliminess may result (9). The possibility of such changes is greater if other directions suggesting 26-33 hours/kg (12-15 hours/lb) for meat/poultry were followed (13). 
A further concern is bringing pathogenic microorganisms into the kitchen that could lead to contamination of surfaces (1) and further cross contamination.
Recommendations
Lee (1) stated that thorough cooking of an unstuffed turkey to 82ºC/180ºF should result in little risk if thawing was complete as any pathogenic vegetative cells present would be destroyed, as well as make it esthetically pleasing. It is presumed that the thawed turkeys will most likely be roasted in an oven.
The current recommendations on thawing poultry developed by different agencies in Canada are similar (5, 13, 14), in that they adamantly state not to thaw at room temperature, (and comment to cook immediately if thawed in the microwave). It is not clear whether these recommendations are based on scientific data or simply someone’s best guess as no references are provided.
Recommended methods such as the use of standing water (5, 14, 15) have not been tested, and the experimental method of running water (1, 12) is not generally recommended in Canada although it is mentioned for “a more rapid thaw” (13), rather than a tested method. However, no one has addressed the large volumes of running water used or the contaminated wastewater that results.
Conclusion   
This paper briefly summarizes the literature currently available for in-home thawing  of               poultry (1, 11, 12).  The studies cautioned about drawing conclusions from direct comparisons because of small sample sizes - often only a single bird per treatment.
As the justification for current thawing recommendations appears inadequate, the question becomes is the emphasis on thawing turkey at refrigerator temperatures warranted. Providing the caveats have been heeded, the need is to cook turkey thoroughly and validate with a meat thermometer. If not completely thawed prior to cooking, adequate end-point temperatures for safety will not be reached within the recommended time given for roasting thawed or fresh turkey. Further, recommended endpoint temperatures vary (1, 8, 14), as do the locations for taking the temperature, all of which may cause confusion for consumers.  There is no information available on how long to cook partially thawed turkey. However, partial cooking of turkey is to be avoided under all circumstances as this could provide ideal conditions for pathogen growth. Further research is necessary to validate best practices in a home kitchen setting. Based on these findings, it is difficult for food and health professionals to provide clients or consumers with clear, consistent, evidence-based messages.  
Relevance to practice
Turkey, a delicious and nutritious low-fat food choice recommended by many dietitians (10, 16), need not be the source of foodborne illness if handled properly and cooked adequately.  Dietitians in the role of highly credible educators on issues related to food and water safety (17) need to emphasize the use of a meat thermometer to validate temperatures for various foods. Because of the extent of conflicting information dietitians should make it a priority to work with various stakeholders to develop and validate best practices for handling foods such as turkey safely. In future, greater emphasis should be placed on the time-temperature relationships in thawing rather than the place thawed. In order to provide consumers with clear, consistent information based on science, additional evidence is needed for alternative thawing methods, dealing with partially thawed turkey, thermometer placement within the turkey,  consistent endpoint temperatures and the estimated times to reach them.
Sidebar 1
Methods of thawing poultry at home
1) at ambient temperatures on the counter without an overwrap
2) on the counter with an overwrap (or paper bag)
3) in the refrigerator
4) under running water
5) in standing water and changing the water at various intervals
6) in the microwave
     
References
    1.     Lee M. Methods and Risks of Defrosting Turkeys. Environ. Health Rev. 1993;(Winter):96-100.
    2.      Health Canada. Health Canada Policy - Food Safety Assessment Program. Available from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/food-aliment/fsa-esa/e_policy.html; accessed 13 April 2002.
    3.    Health Canada. Policy Development for Raw Foods of Animal Origin.. Available from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/food-aliment/mh-dm/mhe-dme/rfao-aoca/e_rfao.html; accessed 13 April 2002.
    4.     Farber JM, Todd ECD. Safe Handling of Foods. New York: Marcel Dekker; 2000. 552p.
    5.    The Canadian Turkey Marketing Agency. How to thaw and prepare…/Did you know... Available from http://www.turkeytuesdays.ca: accessed 13 April 2002.
    6.     Canadian Food Inspection Agency. 1998 Safe Food Handling Study, a Report for Canadian Food Inspection Agency. Environics Research Group Limited. Available from http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/corpaffr/publications/1998environics/study_texte.shtml; accessed 13 April 2002.
    7.     Consumer Education and Information. Food Safety of Turkey ... from Farm to Table. Food Safety Inspection Service, United States Department of Agriculture. Available from http://www.fsis.usda.gov/OA/pubs/focustky.htm; accessed 13 April 2002.
    8.     Snyder OP. HACCP and slow-roasting turkeys. Hospitality Institute of Technology and Management (HITM). Available from http://www.hi-tm.com/Documents/Turkey.html; accessed 13 April 2002.
    9.     Ray B. Fundamental Food Microbiology. Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press; 1996. 516p.
    10.     Eckner KF, Zottola EA, Gravani RB. The microbiology of slow-roasted, stuffed turkeys. Dairy Food Sanit.1988;8(7):344-7.
    11.    Klose AA, Lineweaver H, Palmer HH. Thawing Turkeys at Ambient Air Temperatures. Food tech 1968;22:108-12.
    12.     Jimenez SM, Pirovani ME, Salsi MS, Tiburzi MC, Snyder OP. The Effect of Different Thawing Methods on the Growth of Bacteria in Chicken. Dairyfood environ sanit 2000;20(9):678-83.
13.        Canadian Partnership For Consumer Food Safety Education. Fight BAC! Go to Consumer Centre, Tools. 1998. Available from http://www.canfightbac.org/english/class/chilloute.shtml; accessed 13 April 2002. Copies of the Chill Out brochure can also be ordered from the Beef Information Centre from http://www.beefinfo.org, accessed 13 April 2002.
14.     Canadian Food Inspection Agency. Food Safety Facts for Turkey. Available from http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/corpaffr/foodfacts/turkeye.shtml: accessed 13 April 2002.
15.     It’s your health. Let's Talk Turkey. Health! Canada Magazine December, 2000. Also available from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/food-aliment/mh-dm/iyh-avs/e_let_s_talk_turkey.html; accessed 13 April 2002.
16.        Manitoba Turkey Producers. Nutrition. Available from http://www.turkey.mb.ca/nutrition.html; accessed 29 May 2002.
17.     Ingham S, Thies ML. Food and Water Safety - Position of ADA. J Am Diet Assoc 1997;97:184-9. Available from http://www.eatright.com/adap0297.html; accessed 13 April 2002.

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