So this popped up in my alerts today…

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A question I was asked quite recently, why has there been so many Salmonella outbreaks?  Traditionally, Salmonella has been associated with chicken and eggs.  However, recently there has been outbreaks in sprouting mixes (2), cheese flavoured crackers (3, 4), and frozen berries (5).  The differences between these outbreaks and the ones involving frozen breaded chicken products is that we expect Salmonella in chicken.  One of the reason why there has been an increase in warnings regarding frozen breaded chicken products is because people don’t read instructions.  While the majority of people cook their chicken in the oven for the required amount of time, there is a group of people who do not.  Generally speaking, frozen breaded chicken is not fully cooked before being frozen.  They are par-fried (partially fried) and then quick frozen for quality.  So if you don’t cook it via the instructions, you’re eating raw chicken and increasing your chances of getting Salmonella.  The microwave doesn’t cut it, there are hot and warm spots!

Now why are we seeing more Salmonella in foods not traditionally associated with this bacteria?  The short answer is we don’t know, yet.  There is speculation that it is because Salmonella is ubiquitous, meaning that that these organisms are found EVERYWHERE.  However, if the food plants don’t do their due diligence when it comes to plant maintenance and cleaning, that could be another source of bacteria.  One of the most famous cases of Salmonella that got food scientist scratching their heads is the outbreak involving peanut butter in 2009 (6).  In that case, it was revealed the plant had roaches, rats, mold, dirt, accumulated grease AND a leaky roof (7).  Now most plants are generally not in such a state of disrepair, at least I hope not.

One positive thing to take from all these outbreaks is that there are investigations being done.  There are hard working food safety specialist, scientist, epidemiologist figuring out where the source of contamination, containing it by sending out alerts, and researching way to prevent these occurrences.

Let’s try this again.  The people in my life consistently tell me that I should write a blog about food safety.  I do have a passion for it, so let’s try this out for a bit and see how I do.

While on my maternity leave, I was watching one of my favourite shows, “The Social” (think a friendlier, Canadian version of “The View”), when one of the lovely ladies described how she prepared her meat products – rinsing under water and/or soaking them.  My jaw dropped.  I had always been taught NOT to do such a thing, so of course being a bit of a know it all and wanting to educate people, I got online and explained why we shouldn’t wash our meat under running water.  The amount of people that came back at me with hate and racist comments was astounding.  I mean I’ve always heard that the internet is where trolls come to play but I never thought that it would dissolve into what it did.  Regardless, I stand by the comment and the subsequent comments with links etc.

So why don’t we wash our meat before cooking?  Simply, it can lead to the spread of bacteria around your kitchen.  The stream of water hitting your chicken, beef, pork, fish etc. can aerosolize the liquid on the surface of your meat, spreading it everywhere (1).  I wish I could find a video that CBC did with my friend.  They had this lovely glow-in-the-dark gel that could trace where the chicken juices landed when washed in the sink.  My friend is super cautious and still got this glow-in-the-dark gel everywhere.

The argument that I heard the most was, “I clean my kitchen after washing the meat”.  That’s great, but what do you clean it with? Is it a bleach solution? Bleach can be deactivated by organic material (2).  Not just bleach but other disinfectants are less effective in the presence of organic material.  “I add lemon and vinegar.”  Great flavourants, not so great at killing all the bacteria (3).  “We are too clean.”  Fair enough, but what about those in your life that are immuno-compromised (ie. cancer patients, elderly and children).  Why add more risk when you can mitigate it by just not washing your meat.  Really adding this extra step is a bit time consuming and overall does not lead to a safer food product.

So what should you wash?  Fruits and vegetables (4)!  “But aren’t you spreading the bacteria everywhere.”  Perhaps but I also know that I don’t cook all my fruits and vegetables.  In this case washing the fruits and vegetables is the only step in which you remove bacteria.  Wash those cantaloupes (5)!  Those are notorious for harbouring bacteria.  Also, the bacteria that is present on fruits and vegetable is usually found in the soil and dirt.  Soil and dirt do not aerosolize/splash back up as well as liquid does.  Also rice (6)!  Washing rice is great for removing dirt, little pebbles, insect parts and it removes the surface starch resulting in a less clumpy and gummy rice.  So wash that rice until the water runs clear to remove that outer layer.  Happy cooking everyone!

 

Any questions about food science?  Leave a message in the comments or email me because most likely only friends are reading this 🙂