Tag Archives: Ontario

Kibbeh kontroversy: is raw hamburger banned in Ontario or not? And how should the rules be enforced

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A month after an Ontario health unit decided to enforce a ban on kibbeh – a Lebanese dish made from raw hamburger – one restaurant says it will serve the dish processed instead of ground, sidestepping regulations.

Mazaar restaurant co-owner Imad Najjar told the Windsor Star, "I’m going to serve it until a food processor or a mincer is called a grinder."

Dr. Allen Heimann, Windsor-Essex County chief medical officer, responded, "If meat is sliced thinly while raw, like ceviche, which is Italian, it is not in violation of the regulations. But if it is raw ground meat, then that’s something entirely different."

The latest statements cap weeks of uncertainty, bungling and bad food safety advice.

It began in late June when Windsor-Essex County Health Unit inspectors began forcing Lebanese restaurants to pull product after a report of contaminated raw kibbeh in Ottawa late last year.

Provincial regulations require ground meat cooked to an internal temperature of at least 71 C for at least 15 seconds.

Medical officer Heimann then went on the record to state, “regardless of the popularity of a product, public safety must be my priority.

“Raw kibbeh and steak tartare are raw ground meat dishes that do not conform to section 33(7) paragraph 3 of Ontario Regulation 562, of The Food Premises Regulation.

“This section of the regulation states that all parts of ground meat (other than ground meat containing poultry) must be cooked to reach an internal temperature of at least 71 C for at least 15 seconds. Ground meat containing poultry must be cooked to at least 74 C for at least 15 seconds.

“On July 10, a teleconference was held to discuss the issue with the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care and several other health units, including Ottawa, Toronto and London.

“All of the participating health units confirmed they do not allow the serving of raw ground meat in restaurants. The teleconference group further agreed to continue to review this issue in accordance with the Food Premises Regulation.”

And then things got really confusing.

An Ottawa resident wrote, “The regulation Heimann keeps quoting, that ground meat should be cooked to 71 C, deals with store-bought ground meat that was never intended and should not be used for raw consumption. Kibbeh, tartare and carpaccio do not fall into this category, as any foodie (or 15 seconds on Google) could tell you.”

Raw is raw.

A local medical doctor wrote that he’s never seen a case of E. coli from kibbeh, and that, “if you really wanted to prevent this infection in our community, perhaps Big Brother should ban travel to Mexico.”

It didn’t take long for a raw milk proponent to jump in and argue freedom of choice should apply to all foods.

Maybe. But don’t serve it to kids. The Ontario government needs to come clean on what the rules are and how they should be enforced without leaving local inspectors as the arbiters for bureaucratic indecision.

Do Ontario bureaucrats think it’s OK to serve raw hamburger to children?

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The other thing about food bans is enforcement.

It’s a simple question: does the Ontario government think it’s OK to serve raw hamburger to little kids?

Apparently it does.

The Windsor Star (that’s in Ontario, Canada) reports that “in June 2006, inspectors from the local health unit poured bleach on egg salad sandwiches made by volunteers at the annual Art in the Park festival. They deemed the action necessary to protect public safety.

“The fact that the inspectors saw the sandwiches – sold to help raise funds for Willistead Manor – as a health threat sparked widespread community outrage. It even prompted a sharp rebuke from then-health minister George Smitherman who called the action "asinine."

Except the local folks were doing their job.

“Now the health unit has decided to set its sights on kibbeh – a traditional Lebanese dish of raw ground meat – and ordered restaurants to take the popular food off their menus.”

“It’s understandable why local restaurateurs feel blindsided by the health unit’s decision. As Ministry of Health and Long-term Care spokesperson Zita Astravas told The Star, the province hasn’t banned the preparation of raw kibbeh anywhere.

“And why would it? Kibbeh remains a highly popular dish with customers of all backgrounds.

“In fact, there’s been no documented problem with kibbeh in any restaurant here, or anywhere else in Ontario for that matter.”

There are lots of problems with raw anything. Seek and ye shall find. This is probably more about how terrible surveillance is in Ontario.

But watch bureaucracy in action – and have some sympathy and tea for front-line inspectors who carry out enforcement at the whim of dithering bosses.

“Dr. Allen Heimann, Windsor-Essex County chief medical officer, confirmed the Ottawa incident prompted local action. Heimann said that Ontario regulations stipulate beef must be cooked to an internal temperature of 71 C for 15 seconds before public consumption.

“However, Rishma Govani, Toronto Public Health spokesperson, said that regulation refers specifically to serving cooked meat, and that’s something Toronto’s health unit takes into account when reviewing traditionally prepared ethnic foods.”

There’s science, there’s culture and there’s outbreaks. I wouldn’t advise anyone eat raw hamburger. Bureaucrats need to be clear about the rules – but that’s how to survive in bureaucracy; a bureaucrat survives by vagueness.

8 sick with E. coli O157 in Ontario, source unknown

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Two weeks ago, Canadian bureaucrats said there was an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 linked with consumption of veal liver, but never did say how many people got sick or where.

Tonight, Grey-Bruce public health officials – that’s in Ontario, Canada — are trying to find a link in a cluster of genetically similar cases of E. coli O157 which has sickened eight people over the past several weeks.

Health spokesthingy Angela Newman said, "We’re looking at their food history, where they’ve been travelling, some of their activities in order to determine if there’s any linkage between the cases. At this point, we have not been able to identify any particular link.”

Those sickened range in age from six to 85. Some of the victims are still in hospital, but are "on the mend," Newman said. Some were "pretty ill."

No one seems to know much.
 

Sale of expired baby food investigated after Canadian infant falls ill

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American retailer, Target, is moving into Canada, taking over a bunch of Zellers stores, which were bought by the original Hudson Bay Company in 1978 – Canada, beaver, pelts, etc.

Maybe Target can get the dates right on the babyfood it sells.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has investigated a reported case of food poisoning after an infant was fed baby food — sold by a retailer more than nine months after it had expired.

Kitchener, Ontario, mother Melodie White filed a complaint with the federal food watchdog and the local public health unit after her six-month-old son, Gabriel, became sick over the May long weekend.

She bought several cans of baby food at the Zellers store in the Laurentian Power Center a few weeks ago without realizing they had expired last summer. White became alarmed after she fed the food to her son and he developed a fever and diarrhea, she said.

Her son was sick for about four days, she said.

To back up her claims, White returned to the same store and bought another six cans, all expired. Then she called the store to complain.

The store removed the expired baby food after being made aware of the problem. Inspectors from both the Region of Waterloo Public Health and the inspection agency also visited the Zellers store to make sure the expired baby food was off the shelves.

Salmonella in grape tomatoes: lotsa drama, not much data, third-party audits still don’t mean much

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Canada has to make the simplest things mindnumbingly confusing and bureaucratic. Who has four federal elections in seven years?

On April 29, 2011, Six L’s of Immokalee, Fla. voluntarily recalled a single lot of grape tomatoes, because they had the potential to be contaminated with salmonella. The contamination was detected through a random sample obtained by the U.S. Department of Agriculture at a distributor in New York. The product is from a farm in Estero, Fla. that has since ceased production of that commodity.

The specific lot was packed on April 11 and was comprised of grape tomatoes that can be identified by Cherry Berry lot code DW-H in either in clam shells or 20 lbs. cardboard containers. The product was distributed to North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama, Florida, New Jersey, New York, Michigan, Pennsylvania, California, Georgia and Canada, and reached consumers through retail stores and restaurant distribution.

No one was sick, USDA tested and found something, at least someone was awake.

But that recall grew. It grew and it grew and it grew until Canada decided it had to do something (apologies to Bob Munsch).

On May 2, 2011, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency took time off from voting in the latest federal election to proclaim that Mastronardi Produce of Kingsville, (that’s near Leamington, in Ontario in Canada) was voluntarily recalling grape tomatoes because they may contain Salmonella anatum.

Mastronardi Produce is taking this action after they were notified by a supplier about one lot of tomatoes that was later determined to be contaminated with Salmonella anatum. The supplier was Six L Packing Company from Immokalee, Florida.

Was Mastronardi, a well-known greenhouse vegetable grower, repacking grape tomatoes from Florida? No, just redistributing.

That’s what Richard Lee, operations manager of the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers, told me this afternoon. He also said Mastronardi was “helping out” CFIA types, but that people are “poorly educated” about the difference between greenhouse and field grown tomatoes, so OGVG put out its own press release today.

“OGVG would like the public to be aware that this product is NOT of Canadian origin and NOT Greenhouse grown. The original supplier of these tomatoes was Six L Packing Company from Immokalee, Florida.”

(People who write in all caps are yelling; why are you yelling at me?)

“Retailers and consumers can continue to feel confident when purchasing Ontario greenhouse tomatoes,” said OGVG General Manager, George Gilvesy. “All Ontario greenhouse tomato, cucumber and pepper growers are required to pass an annual third party food safety audit as part of OGVG’s licensing regulations. This helps to ensure that all greenhouse vegetable growers are following important food safety standards.”

How often is water quality tested? How about pathogen testing? Are growers and packers notified before the auditor shows up? Are those results public? The program we designed 13 years ago for the greenhouse veggie growers had all those elements, along with round-the-clock food safety assistance and at least decent communications with buyers and consumers. But third-party auditors became the preference of the industry – the folks that enabled salmonella in peanut paste, E. coli in produce, salmonella in eggs, and virtually every other outbreak over the past decade.

At some point, people will realize that proclaiming a third-party audit in the absence of any meaningful data is groveling to the lowest common denominator.

Sorta like the way the Liberals and Bloc were annihilated in the federal election yesterday. Some Canadians woke up.
 

Food tampering closes Ontario grocery store

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A grocery store in Listowel, Ontario (that’s in Canada) suddenly closed Thursday after needles were found in fruit and meat.

The contaminated food was found Thursday afternoon at the Food Basics store on Wallace Avenue North in Listowel. The store was closed as a safety precaution on one of the busiest grocery days of the year, the day before Easter Weekend.

Police are urging area residents to inspect food carefully when handling it and before eating it.

The Perth County OPP (that’s the Ontario Provincial Police, not the dudes with horses) criminal investigations unit is looking into the incident and is working with store management and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

Ontario egg inspections lack surprise

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My colleague Jim Romahn has started his own blog, Agri 007, and in his latest entry, writes:

There appear to be lots of warnings for egg farmers and grading stations that the enforcers are coming, so few are caught and disciplined.

Take egg quota violations, for example. Egg Farmers of Ontario checks hen numbers when the birds are 23 weeks old. Farmers know when an inspector is coming. If they’re over the limit, they naturally cull their flock to get under the wire. But until then, they could be housing more hens to make more profit.

Take egg grading stations. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency sends advisories that it is coming to check compliance, often a couple of weeks in advance. There may be some merit to advance warning so the company can have its HACCP records ready for inspection, but there is certainly no merit when it comes to checking day-to-day sanitation practices and automated egg grading.

Some retail chains have hired the Guelph Food Technology Centre to conduct audits for them. In these cases, too, there has been advance warning. I am told that signs have gone up in at least one plant to advise staff to practice “zero tolerance” on those days.

The federal and provincial governments have granted egg farmers extraordinary powers over production and pricing, but in return have asked them to provide the public with a steady supply of safe and wholesome eggs. Egg farmers who value supply management and want to retain public trust surely realize that discipline is crucial, especially related to food safety.
The management at Egg Farmers of Ontario is surely aware of the possibility that some members cheat on production limits, so why not have some more surprise inspections? The management is obviously aware now of allegations that cracks have made it into the Grade A table market, posing a risk to food safety, so what has it done?
 

Meals for kids from local restaurants should be safe; local school types should demand safety standards

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Wellesley, Ontario, home of the annual Wellsley Apple Butter and Cheese Festival , the last Saturday every September, is a nice enough place. Now populated largely by commuters who want the tech jobs in Waterloo, Ontario, but the small-town lifestyle, the place keeps on.

But those commuting parents may want to check out what is being served to their kids at the local school.

As reported by The Elmira Independent, a local paper with lotsa investigative journalism credibility, 28 children ordered hamburgers on March 3, 2011, as part of Wellesley public school’s regular hot lunch program.

The hamburgers arrived at the school, wrapped in tin foil, from Wellesley restaurant and catering business The Grill and Chill Drive In; a number of students complained about finding “pinkish red,” undercooked hamburger in their meals.

Color is a lousy indicator of food safety, but when public health types visited the The Grill and Chill Drive In, they found failure to maintain records of manufactured meat to aid in identification, and failing to ensure food was cooked to a minimum internal temperature.

No thermometers.

Once informed of the potentially raw hamburgers, Wellesley principal Lee Anne Andriessen immediately called Region of Waterloo Public Health. She was told to collect all of the remaining hamburgers so they could run a full screen of the meat for any pathogens.

“Her concern was for the safety of the children involved,” said Brenda Miller.
The region’s manager of infection control, rabies, and vector borne diseases, said it was the principal’s good diligence that sparked the investigation and allowed health inspectors to begin work the same day.

Public health officials made calls to parents of all 28 children who had ordered meals to warn them about possible symptoms their children may experience if the undercooked meat was ingested.

Miller said 20 different samples were tested and no pathogenic organisms were isolated.

Miller said public health officials will continue to work with the school board to provide food safety awareness.

All schools that offer hot lunch programs through outside catering companies are advised to make sure the food coming into schools is produced at regularly-inspected premises.

In the weeks following the incident, the school has continued to use hot lunches supplied by the restaurant under investigation by public health, although the menu was different and hasn’t included any hamburger.

If parents want the service for their kids, fine, but ask questions grounded in food safety: like using a thermometer to make sure food is properly cooked, handwashing compliance, sourcing food from safe sources. An annual inspection from the local health types is not enough.
 

No Chef’s Challenge this year after 200 sick with cyclospora last year

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In May, 2010, at least 43 people were lab-confirmed to be sickened with cyclospora and over 200 displayed symptoms of illness after attending the Chef’s Challenge, a fundraiser for the Big Sisters of Sarnia-Lambton in Ontario, Canada.

"It wasn’t something we were able to go ahead with this year given the incident that took place," said executive director Kathy Alexander.

Local health types figured the source of the cyclospora was a cool pesto crunch but couldn’t identify the ingredient.
 

Jim Romahn: Ontario egg whistleblower silenced – for now

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The Supreme Court in London, Ontario has squelched whistleblower Norman Bourdeau – for now.

Madame Justice Helen Rady granted the request of lawyer Helen Webster, who was acting for L.H. Gray and Son Ltd. and its egg-production and egg-marketing businesses.
Webster cited the “sensitivity of the matter” and said the stack of documents filed in connection with the case contain “sensitive commercial information” such as about egg grading.

Justice Rady granted both of Webster’s requests – to seal the court documents, meaning the public can no longer look at them – and to “close the courtroom” while she and lawyer Rod Refcio, acting for Bourdeau, presented their agreement calling for an “interim injunction.”

If that injunction is similar to the main one filed by Gray and containing information used for news reports before the Tuesday, Feb. 22, hearing, it will prevent Bourdeau from releasing any information he has gathered about the Gray company and from speaking to anyone about the information.

Justice Rady told Webster that the sealing order will be “re-examined” when the case moves along to the stage of a “special appointment” before a different judge.

She said court proceedings should be open to the public.