Bathtub Cheese Lands Couple in Jail
Last week officials from the California Department of Food and Agriculture, along with local police, arrested a California couple on "felony cheese manufacturing charges" after they were found with 375 pounds of illegally-manufactured soft cheese at a market in San Bernadino County.
"Bathtub cheese," as it is known on the street, is made by unlicensed cheesemakers (whether in a tub or in a stockpot) and can cause some serious food-poisoning (listeria, E. coli, salmonella) if manufactured under less than sanitary conditions.
The cheeses seized included panela, queso fresco and queso oaxaca, and in fact "bathtub cheese" is quite common in Latin American communities. In fact over the years there have been several outbreaks of food poisoning associated with homemade Mexican cheeses.
It's tempting to think of this just another example of the government interfering with the innocent activities of ordinary people and spreading fear unnecessarily; however, some of these food borne illnesses can be truly devastating. Listeria can cause "miscarriage or stillbirth, premature delivery, or infection of the newborn" if ingested by a pregnant woman. So while I'm just as pro-raw milk cheese as the next guy, even when it comes to raw milk cheeses aged fewer than 60 days, it can't be disputed that it's an industry that needs tight regulation with strict adherence to food safety procedures.
[Via BarfBlog, irreverent source for all your food safety news bites from KSU's International Food Safety Network.]
About the author: Jamie Forrest publishes Curdnerds.com from his apartment in Brooklyn, New York, where he lives with his wife, his daughter, and his cheese. Photograph from le on Flickr.
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1 Comment:
Actually, we can dispute most regulation.
I fail to see where the regulation would have changed the situation, except perhaps after the fact. It seems to me the so-called legal manufacturers are more comfortable coming forward after they poison someone. Meanwhile the "illegal" manufacturers are afraid of prosecution; they stop selling (no-one wants dead customers) but they don't want to draw attention to the issue either.
With the bagged spinach and other "legal" outbreaks, people still get poisoned. The regulation merely makes everyone more comfortable.
Augustiv at 4:24PM on 10/30/07