Monthly Archives: January 2011

The difficulties of food safety culture and talking about it on The Daily Edition

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Last week I had lunch with a colleague at a bar and grill-style restaurant close to campus and ordered a burger. The server asked me how I wanted it cooked and I replied “well done”, the quick and easy response, and a bit of a cop-out on my part.

The server prodded me a bit, saying that they use really high quality meat and sort of dared me, or at least nudged me, to reconsider something like medium well. Taking this as an opening, I asked her if the kitchen had a thermometer and if they could cook my burger to 160F. I’ve asked this question before at other restaurants (sometimes to the dismay of my dining partners) and have been given a “yeah right” and chuckle – even though the 155F for 15 seconds or 160F guideline is in the FDA food code (my first encounter with this was while playing golf with Doug at a food safety conference).

Our server looked at me a bit weird, said she figured they had a thermometer because they have “pretty good kitchen staff” and would ask.  She came back five minutes later and said that the line cook had a thermometer, they use it all the time, and it would be no problem to get a 160F burger.

While the server didn’t really steer me in the right direction, the kitchen got it right. One of the difficulties in creating a good food safety culture in a food service setting is the disconnect between the serving staff (who don’t always seem to know much about risks) and the kitchen staff (who are doing most of the risk reduction).

I told this story on Friday on Dan Benjamin’s show, The Daily Edition. I’ve become a bit of a regular with Dan after getting the hook-up from contributor and friend of barfblog, Don Schaffner a few months back. This week we chatted  about bacon, deli meat, fresh produce and Dan’s fav food safety topic, homemade beef jerky. Check out the episode here.

No food safety culture in Paraguay

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While showing my sister-in-law around Paraguay, we stopped at the mall to let her sample typical “snack” food. Back in the day, ladies on the side of the road sold this type of snack food with baskets on their heads. In some parts of the country, it is still sold this way – but that’s a whole different food safety story.

Nowadays this “snack” is a trendy thing and there are food stands everywhere. The company that owns the stand we stopped at even has a website and offers delivery. It is worth mentioning that a former food safety newsie trainee (who only lasted a week) owns the stand.

Out of three people running the little stand, only one was observed to have washed his hands properly – once. After taking out the trash and making sure it all fit down the bag, he went on with his cooking duties without washing his hands. I think his rationale was, “One hand washing is good enough”.

Similarly, the employee in charge of making fresh juice washed her hands only once and didn’t use soap, which was available. Her rationale was probably “plain water is good enough.”

It was obvious that food safety was not a concern, and customers don’t demand it either. Apparently, the stereotypical Paraguayan motto of “minimal effort” applies to the food safety culture as well.
 


 

Market food safety rather than fear

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Coles Supermarkets is an Australian supermarket chain owned by Wesfarmers. It has 742 stores nationally and more than 93,000 employees. Coles currently has the second-largest market share behind Woolworths Supermarkets.

Coles is now using celebrity chef thingy Curtis Stone to push its ‘No Bull’ campaign, which proclaims all beef sold at Coles is free of hormone growth promotants, or HGPs – supplements of naturally occurring hormones that reduce farming costs because they cause cattle to produce more beef from less feed.

Similar marketing claims have made by Whole Foods and Chipotle in the U.S., both which suck at food safety. Tyson tried it with antimicrobials and was told by a judge to stop because of the bull involved.

Meat and Livestock Australia, which acts on behalf of 47,000 meat producers, said Coles’ marketing strategy could frighten consumers into thinking beef from cattle raised on growth-promoting hormones was unsafe, despite years of scientific testing showing it posed no risk.

The group told The Sunday Age it was too early to tell if customers had stopped buying beef from retailers other than Coles, but if the industry was forced to stop using hormones due to unwarranted fear, ramifications could be widespread.

Victorian Farmers Federation president Andrew Broad said, “They’re creating a monster in the mind of consumers that this is bad … when the reality is there are no health risks with HGPs. The campaign implies that there’s some chemical being pumped into the beef, which is just a nonsense.”

Never go with the no-risk message. There are always risks, but these are miniscule compared with the risks of dangerous microorganisms associated with beef. I’m still waiting for someone to step up and market microbial food safety – so there’s fewer sick people out there.

Simon Berger of Woolworths, rightly dismissed the campaign as “a supermarket gimmick that will be bad for the environment and bad for Australian farmers,” and that it would not follow Coles’ hucksterism.

“We have absolute confidence in the Australian beef industry … We have no plans to dictate to them how it’s produced. Removing technology means you need more cattle, eating more food, on more land, producing more methane over more time to produce the same beef. Someone will pay for that – either farmers or customers, as well as the environment.”

Coles spokesman Jim Cooper defended the campaign, and stressed that Coles wasn’t saying HGP-raised beef was unsafe, it was saying that HGP-free beef was of a higher quality and tasted better, adding, “We are doing what we need to do to improve the quality of beef we sell to customers and that’s all this is about for us.”

But nothing to improve the microbial safety of beef Coles sells to consumers.

CSIRO Professor Alan Bell confirmed there was no proof that HGPs in beef posed a health threat to consumers. But a recent CSIRO study, published in the journal Animal Production Science, supports Coles’ assertion that HGP-free beef is more tender. The study found the hormones had a ”negative influence” on tenderness, taste and quality.

HGPs have been used in Australia since 1979, and about 40 per cent of cattle are now implanted with slow-release HGPs, which add an estimated $210 million in production gains to the Australian beef industry each year.

The group said the amount of hormones found in HGP-raised beef was far lower than the level of hormones naturally occurring in many foods. One egg contained about the same amount of estrogen as 77 kilograms of beef.
 

Flying Pig, Cheeky Monkey porn in food trucks

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The proliferation of food trucks in urban centers must be real because now there is a pornographic movie set in a food truck – literally.

However a legal dispute has developed between The Flying Pig catering truck and Metro Movies, which produced the flick under the name Cheeky Monkey, Inc., with allegations the Pig didn’t know it was a porn shoot, while the Monkey says, “the owner watched the DVD and raved about what he saw … saying in a letter, "SEX + FOOD + FUN = well, just about all my favorite things! A 10 for sure."

The porn company says they have no plans to stop the release of the film — as Flying Pig demanded — because the truck people knew exactly what they were getting into.

I will review the film for food safety infractions.
 

Local is worst: Canadians export food that’s tested, keep the rest for home and blame consumers if they get sick

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A B.C. meat processing plant that covered up lab results revealing a sample of its product was contaminated with a deadly E. coli strain will not have to test for the bacteria now that it’s provincially regulated.

Pitt Meadows Meats Ltd. said it made a business decision to abandon its federal licence because it incurs higher costs than are necessary because the company doesn’t export.

Regulations require federally licensed plants to report positive findings of E. coli O157 strain to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

But testing for E. coli O157 isn’t mandatory in a provincially regulated plant.

Joseph Beres, inspection manager for the Canada Food Inspection Agency, said federal and provincial plants are committed to the same health and sanitation standards and use the same inspectors. But he said the presence of the deadly bacteria might only be discovered if people become sick.

Ritinder Harry, a spokesman for the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, told CBC News, apparently with a straight face and acting like he’d never heard of the U.S. zero tolerance policy for E. coli O157:H7 that has been in place since 1994, and the whole Mike-Taylor-it-doesn’t-get-us-anywhere-to-blame-consumers-for-O157-bit, also back in 1994, that provincial meat processing facilities are not required to regularly test for pathogens because "the likelihood of finding a contaminated sample is very low,” and that the best way to eliminate risk of being infected is to follow basic food safety rules, including using a thermometer to ensure the meat is properly cooked, avoiding cross contamination with raw meat or raw meat juices in the kitchen, and promptly refrigerating meat regardless of whether it is cooked or uncooked.

This isn’t some Greasy Jungle, Metropolis Noir, with funeral home sandwiches and coffee. People get sick.


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Nosestretcher alert: food safety is not simple, even if a $5 billion corporation says it is

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Memo to Michael McCain, CEO, Maple Leaf Foods Inc.:

You or your company, or both, really suck at this communication about food safety risk thing.

In the two years since your killer deli meats actually killed 23 Canadians with listeria and sickened another 50 or so, the best you can do is remind Canadians they should do more?

I understand you probably had some PR-type tell you that Maple Leaf needed third-party experts to validate and endorse your food safety messages, what with killing all those people. Except that third-party validation has been invalidated since the mid-1990s. As a company, you’re better to make public everything you’re doing.

And I understand the web site being promoted by the Canadian Public Health Association was underwritten by the company, and the messages probably came unfiltered from CPHA.

But it’s your name, and your company’s reputation on the web site.

And it doesn’t look good.

After the listeria mess of 2008 in Canada, your company has taken a bunch of baby steps to apparently engage the Canadian public, like targeting bloggers, showing up at food safety meetings and talking about culture.

But if you really want to regain the trust of Canadians, like my parents, who were in Kansas the other day, and my father who said he’d never buy Maple Leaf again, here’s what you can actually do:

* make listeria test results in Maple Leaf plants public;
• add warning labels on deli meats for at-risk populations, like pregnant women and all those old people that unnecessarily died; and,
• market Maple Leaf’s food safety efforts at retail so consumers can actually choose.

Instead, you and your company decide to put your resources into a web site – who doesn’t need another web site – that says,

“Although Canada has one of the best food safety systems in the world, there are still 11 to 13 million cases of foodborne illness across the country each year. That means your ability to stay healthy—whether or not you’re pregnant—depends on what food you eat, how well you store your food at home, and how carefully you prepare it before you eat. …

“As the consumer, once you buy a food product, you are the next link in the chain that keeps your food safe and healthy. This website will give you the information you need to guide you in choosing the right foods, and preparing and storing them safely”

“Eat Safe! is brought to you by the Canadian Public Health Association (CPHA) in partnership with Maple Leaf Foods.

“The contents are for informational purposes only and should never replace the advice and care of a health care professional. Neither CPHA nor Maple Leaf Foods guarantees that the information is accurate, complete, or timely. Neither CPHA nor Maple Leaf Foods will be liable for any direct or indirect loss, damage, or injury caused by the use of this information. CPHA does not endorse and shall not in any way be seen as endorsing any products or services that may be referred in this website. Food Safety For Higher Risk Canadaians is brought to you by the Canadian Public Health Association (CPHA) supported through an unrestricted educational grant from Maple Leaf Foods Inc.”

Wow. Instead of saying, treat deli meats like raw chicken poop, or toxic waste, cause a lot of people can die in a listeria outbreak, CPHA offers up Maple Leaf-funded platitudes that consumers should do more.

I look forward to the evaluation of such nonsense being published in a peer-reviewed journal so the rest of us mortals can better understand the methodology and thinking behind such nonsensical statements.

I do like the multiple language components of the website, but the rest is derogatory, paternalistic, and corporate. It’s like listening to a Journey song and having someone insist it’s real rock and roll.
 

Raw egg facials may be a bad idea

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bites-l newsie Gonzalo Erdozain writes his wife recently applied a raw egg facial mask.

He’s worried about salmonella, she wants to tighten her pores.

According to a quick web search, egg white apparently draws the oils out, while the egg yolk moisturizes. Another says raw eggs are an excellent enhancement for a person’s hair care regimen. Among the recommendations:

“To use raw eggs as part of your facial care regimen, crack two eggs into a bowl. Mix the whites of the eggs and the yolks of the eggs together. Apply the raw egg mixture to your face. When you use raw eggs as part of your facial regimen, you don’t have to worry with avoiding the eyes. Massage the egg mixture into the face. Let it set for five to ten minutes. Rinse away with a soft washcloth and warm water. … Look for the best natural skin care in your grocer’s dairy section.”

This is a bad idea. Eggs are for cooking and eating, not facials.
 

Bravo chesse now pasteurizing milk after making 38 barf

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There is a disconnect between people who produce food, and those they sicken.

Three months after she sampled gouda cheese at a Costco and got sick, a Colorado teenager and her family have decided:

• no more ground beef;
• no more sharing friends’ lunch food at school; and,
• no more tasting cheese, salmon or any other morsels that food stores offer to entice customers.

Madisyn Kirby, 15, who lives in Castle Rock, said the illness that doubled her over in October "was the scariest, worst time of my life. I never want it to happen again."

Madisyn’s family has filed a lawsuit in Douglas County Court claiming Bravo Farms-brand Dutch Style Gouda Cheese she sampled at a Costco store near Park Meadows mall was contaminated by E. coli.’’

Federal and state health authorities linked Bravo Farms cheese to an E. coli outbreak last fall that caused 38 illnesses in Colorado and other Western states.

Yesterday, Bravo Farms co-owner Jonathan Van Ryn said the company’s back in business and last fall’s E. coli outbreak apparently resulted from "an isolated instance of one day’s production."

Madisyn probably doesn’t feel like an isolated case.

Alicia Cronquist, director of foodborne illness investigations at the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment said a state health team detected "way too many E. coli cases being reported in the Denver metro area. … One thing that stood out was that many had sampled cheese at a large warehouse store. Home visits and lab tests pin-pointed gouda and other cheese samples as the source.

Jon Van Ryn estimated shutdown and recall costs at around $1.5 million and that Bravo, which has specialized in making raw-milk cheeses, is now pasteurizing its milk.

Duh.
 

Dirty dining at HK Star, Vegas

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HK Star, a Chinatown restaurant in Las Vegas, recently received 32 demerits and a "C" grade after a visit from the Southern Nevada Health District.

Violations included raw pork stored over raw fish; packaged crab found thawing at room temperature; a sink missing a thermometer for measuring proper water temperature when washing dishes; and dirty pans found in a hand sink.

Inspectors also noted improper hand washing by several employees, and a number of areas were cited for their dirty conditions, including the walls and the floor.

The Southern Nevada Health District confirms that HK Star is now operating under a four demerit "A" grade.

Channel 13 did some digging into the restaurant’s history and found that it received a "C" grade every year of operation since opening in 2009.
 

Pet food porn

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With an appeal to the simplistic, Barbara Laino says, “We know processed foods are wrong for us. It has to be wrong for them. If you can feed yourself healthily and your children, then you can feed your pets healthily, too. It really isn’t that hard.”

Laino is talking about the standard recipe she uses to feed her Alaskan malamute, another dog and three cats in her house for around 10 days: grind 40 pounds of pasture-raised chicken necks with another 20 pounds of chicken giblets. To this, she adds five pounds of carrots, a whole cabbage and several other fruits, all from the organic fields of Midsummer Farm, Ms. Laino’s farm in Warwick, N.Y. Finally, she blends the mix with herbs and supplements.

She tells the New York Times in a piece of pet food porn that she wants for her pets what she wants for herself: a healthy diet of unprocessed organic foods. And now she teaches others.

Cesar Millan, host of the television show “The Dog Whisperer,” says, “The dog has always been a mirror of the human style of life. Organic has become a new fashion, a new style of living.”

Cesar got the lifestyle bit right, because that is all it is; as for microbiological safety, the cross-contamination risks alone in the food prep sound daunting.

Nancy K. Cook, the vice president at the Pet Food Institute, a trade association for commercial pet food makers, cautions pet owners that it is hard to create a balanced diet at home, since dogs and cats have specific nutritional requirements.

Joseph J. Wakshlag, a clinical nutritionist at the Baker Institute for Animal Health at Cornell University, said that if pets are not fed the correct balance of proteins, fats, minerals and vitamins, they can experience several health disorders, including anemia, broken bones and loss of teeth from lack of calcium.

Korinn Saker, a clinical nutritionist at the College of Veterinary Medicine at North Carolina State University, who treats animals at the school’s teaching hospital, said she was not against people cooking for their pets, but that if it was not done correctly, the consequences could be harmful.

She has seen several dogs with adverse effects from unbalanced homemade pet food diets, including a German shepherd puppy “who was walking on its elbows because it had no strength in its bones,” she said. The dog, it turned out, was not getting enough calcium.

Dr. Saker, asked to analyze the recipe from Ms. Laino’s workshop, found that it was lacking in a number of nutrients recommended by the Association of American Feed Control Officials.

Ms. Laino said she rejects the standards recommended by the feed association, and suggested that her recipe might be richer in certain nutrients because the ingredients are organic.

Hucksterism is alive and well for Barbara Laino and the N.Y. Times.