On Demand
Where's the Beef?
This weekend 21.7 million pounds of beef patties from Topps Meat were recalled due to contamination from E.coli bacteria. Chris Waldrop, director of the Food Policy Institute at the Consumer Federation of America, talks about inspection standards by the USDA and FDA, and whether technology might help stop health recalls such as this.
Topps Meat Website, which contains information on the recall.
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That's why I only eat frozen chopped up cows that have been pumped up with antibiotics and chlorine!
how long can meat be frozen?
Mixing yesterday's batch with today's batch is something one would not, certainly should not, do in one's own kitchen.
For a listing (complete???) of the products and the stores in which they were sold, look here: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2007/09/ny_ecoli3.html
According to Michael Pollan, the E. coli problem in beef is due to them being corn-fed. The corn is not the best food for cattle which makes them sick and encourages the E. coli growth (which must be treated with antibiotics- creates resistant E. coli). This is a problem in cows fed organic corn too. Grass fed beef is less likely to have the virulent E. coli strain that is the major problem today.
Would a meat/food irraduation policy prevent this type of public scare?
I stopped eating ground meat some time ago, my fear to mad cow disease. you know that all American beef is not tested for mad cow disease?
the idea of carry-over includes any material left in the processing equipment. including the grinders which always have a "dead" space by their design which is supposed to be evacuated and then the machine be sterilized. i doubt if any operator would leave already ground material in a contaminatable situation
I just visited the USDA web site and searched Hamberger Recall...nothing pertaining to this Topps recall appeared. The USDA website seems more interested in promoting the Secretary than informing the public
Consumer Reports had a certified lab. check major brand whole chicken - all chicken contaminated with the 2 key pathogens. Including organic chicken!
on m fisher's point,
that's also why one criteria of the best cooks' knives is
a rounded edge between handle and blade,
so food can't collect there.
Quite unfortunate that it takes a scare like this for people to consider where their food comes from and how it may have been processed before it hits the shelves.
The best way to avoid having to worry about such issues is to consider a vegan or vegetarian diet. Re foodborne illness from vegetables...organic is probably the best way to go.
Where does all the contaminated beef go? Think of tons of it going into landfills. Yuck.
to the 80 year old woman who called in about ground lamb...
my butcher explained that if a packaged product is called "lamb patties", the FDA standards allow up to 50% ground beef to be added to the ground lamb.
Forgot to give Consumers Reports story link:
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/food-safety/chicken-safety/chicken-safety-1-07/overview/0107_chick_ov.htm
By the way Jamie Oliver, the Chef, says to not buy ground meat - period. He says any part of the steer could end up in the mix.
Oliver says to buy Chuck steak and then use any food processor (blade) to chop the meat into a mix of small and slightly larger pieces (is best for burgers.)
A long long time ago I remember seeing a program on ch 13 PBS that was called "Meat". It was a cradle to table story following a calf, and it stuck in my mind. It would be great to find that, it would probably break me and many of consuming meat products.
If you can know your farmer and buy meet from a farm/ranch where the animals are grass fed in the sunshine without pesticides, you will probably get better nutrition and the animal gets a nicer life. As the animal gets what he/she is made to process (grass/hay/no grain)there is no pollution through farts or ecoli. If we only realized how disconnected we are due to industry, and what our greed does to us as well as to livestock.
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