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Friday, June 6, 2008

Hot Beef Carcasses

posted by on June 6 at 15:14 PM

Finding out about the new federal cases regarding food contamination is so much fun—remember the Class II Recall of Frozen Cattle Heads That Contain Prohibited Materials?—that I signed up for more USDA email news. I recently received my first USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service New Technologies Update, and while certainly applying technology to food is generally a good idea, a lot of this sounds depraved. Vegetarians, get your gloat all shined up; now is truly the time.

The New Technologies Update contains “new, or new applications of, equipment, substances, methods, processes, or procedures affecting the slaughter of livestock and poultry or processing of meat, poultry, or egg products” that have been “received and reviewed, and for which FSIS has had ‘no objection’ to use in FSIS establishments.”

Highlights from the newest in New Technologies:

Meyn America LLC: Meyn evisceration system can operate at 140 birds per minute on eight inch shackle spacing with four Federal inspectors

Tasker Products*: Use of pHarlo Blue as an antimicrobial processing aid applied in poultry scalders, as a spray on poultry picker rails, and post-picker spray or dip

Olsson, Frank and Weeda, P.C.: Use of up to 5% lactic acids on hot beef carcasses

Cargill Meat Solutions: Hide-On Beef Carcass Washing System using sodium hydroxide applied at the post-exsanguination stage of slaughter

Braswell Foods, Inc.: The In-package Pasteurization of Liquid Egg and Egg Products

Ecolab, Inc.: Reuse of Inspexx 100 ™ poultry wash and chill process water to reduce microbial contamination on raw edible poultry products and/or to wash poultry processing equipment and environmental surfaces

Ashland Specialty Chemical: Reuse of Chlorine Dioxide as an antimicrobial agent in poultry processing water (locations-application cabinets, feather rinses and pickers/scalders)

The list goes on.

Elsewhere, the FSIS is no longer allowing Tyson Foods to use the “Raised Without Antibiotics That Impact Human Antibiotic Resistance” label, having discovered that contrary to information that Tyson itself provided in December, they are in fact using questionable antibiotics in chicks. Peep!

Beware the mass-market meats, birds, and fish.

RSS icon Comments

1

I didn't say anything.

Posted by elenchos | June 6, 2008 3:23 PM
2

The FDA Food Recalls site is also fun reading. Here's a gem from last month! "FDA Warns Consumers Against Using Mommy's Bliss Nipple Cream"

Posted by kid icarus | June 6, 2008 3:38 PM
3

It's worth it to me.

Posted by Bellevue Ave | June 6, 2008 3:51 PM
4

Don't bother vegetarians, the overwhelming majority of food safety issues comes from contaminated fruits and vegetables.

Don't get me wrong though, when the meat industry takes short-cuts, it is disgusting and dangerous.

Posted by Dougsf | June 6, 2008 4:07 PM
5

Eh. I am not surprised, shocked, offended, or outraged at any of this.

Friday apathy has taken over.

Posted by Original Monique | June 6, 2008 4:12 PM
6

@4: It's easier to wash fruits and vegetables than meat.

Posted by Jerod | June 6, 2008 4:14 PM
7

No it's not.

But also realize that 100% of the contaminants that got on those fruits and vegetables came from animal waste.

Posted by Fnarf | June 6, 2008 4:31 PM
8

@6,

But you're also less likely to eat fruit and vegetables raw.

Posted by keshmeshi | June 6, 2008 4:31 PM
9

@6,

But you're also less likely to eat meat raw.

Posted by keshmeshi | June 6, 2008 4:32 PM
10

Shit. My first comment did go through. Argh.

Posted by keshmeshi | June 6, 2008 4:33 PM
11

@9: Yeah, you got me there...

Posted by Jerod | June 6, 2008 4:48 PM
12

#6 - not totally true. Bacteria should (of course there's crazy shit like BSE, but that's one-in-a-million, and a whole 'nuther story) only live on the surface of the meat. That's why we flip with tongs, not forks (puncturing the meat will lead to interior contamination, if you check your meat's temperature this way, you're better off eating it "well done", or checking after it's been seared well). It's analogous to probably eating a bruised apple (you can, but be careful).

Much contamination does come from animal waste like FNARF said, but not all, maybe not even most. E-Coli and salmonella in alfafa sprouts is one of the most common severe food illnesses and occurs because of the nature of how they're grown. There are also dangerous, but fairly rare, contamination that occur in soil naturally like listeria (it happens), and anthrax (pretty rare, I think).

Posted by Dougsf | June 6, 2008 4:50 PM
13

But I will agree, Jerod - raw vegetables are a lower maintenance item to prep that raw for eating that raw meat.

Posted by Dougsf | June 6, 2008 5:05 PM
14

Crap, I can't talk. You know what I mean.

Posted by Dougsf | June 6, 2008 5:05 PM
15

Someone also needs to inform the public about meat products labeled "mechanically separated meat." You see it listed on hot dogs, sausage, kielbasas, and sometimes ground meat.

It's a horror story for the consumer - that which is squeezed out of the animal and made into a meat slurry that is then packaged as 100% beef, chicken, turkey, whatever.

Maybe people are willing to close their eyes to these practices because in doing meat reclamation the price of an item is kept down. But blech.

Posted by Bauhaus | June 6, 2008 7:02 PM
16

Sorry!
For those in the bubble enclave of Seattle, this is where you food comes from. I dont care what you call it..Organic...Farm Raised, whatever...unless you have a farmer you are willing to travel to, and purchase directly from, you are feeding the machine of factory farms.

Hmmm..
Gee.
For all the gnashing of teeth and screaming I have heard from you self righteous assholes who tell me to move, (reference the thread about having the word FAG scrawled on my barn) suddenly you have an opinion about food.

God forbid we have a dispersed community with community farmers..no no no..we must live in a population dense community. With lots of hi-rises and let the farmer suck it up and bear the cost of transporting YOUR food to you.

So whats next? When the farmers bring in the recently butchered chicken, cattle or hog you will find a way to bitch about the oh so unacceptable waste of fossil fuels?
Better yet, GROW YOUR OWN!

Grow up.

Meat and poultry are not raised in a piece of styrofoam and glad wrap. Like any other market we are expected to perform.
Small poultry? Small cattle? Lower price.
Quit bitchin and do something. Stop buying, protest, do something! Otherwise we have to play by the industry standards.


C. Plount
Wauzeka, WI

Posted by Irascible | June 6, 2008 9:31 PM
17

Somebody wrote "FAG" on your barn? In Wisconsin? That's ridiculous. I'm sorry.

I agree with you, actually, and I WANT you to truck your small-farm produce into town -- maybe not this town, you're a couple of thousand miles away. But yeah, I buy at farmer's markets. I buy some mass produced stuff too; perfection is an irrational goal. But I try to buy from farmers when I can, and I don't mind paying higher prices if I can afford it.

Go easy on us, Mr. Plount; we're learning and trying to do better just like everybody else is. I'm pro-farmer; I just wish David Letterman didn't get a million dollars of that so-called "farm subsidy" money.

Posted by Fnarf | June 6, 2008 10:22 PM
18

@ 17 Thank you. Thank you very much. I got a little hot under the collar.

Posted by Irascible | June 6, 2008 10:42 PM
19

As someone who keeps chickens... it's extremely difficult to keep any kind of reasonable mortality level without using a medicated feed or vaccinating all the chicks. And that's for a home, outdoor, range sort of chicken. I'd prefer it if they didn't use any antibiotics, but by the time the chick is eaten, they should be well out of the system.

Posted by wench | June 7, 2008 12:40 AM
20

All that, and also the worldwide shortage of grain, which is not just because of biofuels... it's also because the emerging middle class in countries like China and India can suddenly afford to buy meat regularly.

Time to get out that good old copy of Diet for a Small Planet!

Posted by k | June 8, 2008 6:21 AM
21

Your list is a little dated. Ashland is no longer in the poultry pathogen control business. You are going to see much, much more water reuse in every type of industry, not just food. The best way to reuse water would be to put a potable water plant at the end of the pipe of the sewer plant. It is eventually going to come to that anyway. Water is the most precious commodity we have, right up there with the air we breathe. Get used to recycling everything.

Posted by rivervalleymgb | June 8, 2008 1:19 PM

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