Entries tagged with 'food safety'
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Cooking ground beef to 160°F kills E. coli (and perhaps your desire to eat it). [TCPalm] Five healthy food trends: Cooking Light identifies five good-for-you food trends. [Cooking Light/CNN] Beverly Hills institutes smoking ban in outdoor dining areas: California law prohibits smoking inside restaurants, cafes, and bars. A growing number of cities have taken things a step further by banning smoking in outdoor venues. [L.A.Times] Gamble away your money and your health: In Tunica, Mississippi, "a 560-seat Paula Deen's Buffet will be installed at the Grand Casino Resort Tunica." Deen is the woman, you'll remember, who offers a deep-fried butter recipe. [Associated Press] Battle over best way to ensure food import safety: Government and food industry officials favor high-tech...
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Thirty years ago, leafy spinach wasn't the green enemy and contaminated Odwalla juice hadn't killed a kid yet. These and other food policy issues were discussed at last week's 30th annual National Food Policy Conference in downtown D.C., where Serious Eats was on the scene with a room full of scientists, congressional members, strategists from Tyson and Kraft foods, and the conference BMOCs—the "ag" crowd (the USDA and FDA). 'In my day, we didn't die trying to eat PB and J.' Experts discussed issues like contaminated Peter Pan peanut butter, healthier school lunches, and the farm bill. Snarkiest among panelists was molecular biologist and Kansas State University professor Douglas Powell, who said media wasn't doing enough. In his web forum,...
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Michael Ruhlman and Anthony Bourdain announce the inaugural Golden Clog Awards, the best and worst of the year in food. The award categories run the gamut from the Rocco Award, for worst career move by a talented chef, to the Chef's Chef Award, for the least heralded yet most deserving working chef. [Ruhlman.com] Economics drive surge in U.S. food imports: " 'There are economic factors that are pushing' this growth in food imports, David Acheson, FDA's food safety czar, said at a conference on food policy. 'The expectation is, I don't want to pay $5 for a head of lettuce. How are you going to deal with that? You import the food,' he said." [Reuters] More efforts to regulate U.S....
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Yes. Again. Another food scare. This time it's bagged lettuce from Dole: The voluntary recall, issued Monday, affects all packages of Hearts Delight sold in the United States and Canada with a "best if used by" date of September 19, 2007, and a production code of "A24924A" or "A24924B," the company said.... The latest recall affects packages sold in Ontario, Quebec and the Maritime Provinces in Canada and in Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Tennessee starting around Sept. 8, said Marty Ordman, a Dole spokesman. If you live in the affected areas, check your fridge!...
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Caffeine may bolster women's memories. [cbsnews.com, via Yumsugar] FDA drops ball, allows one million pounds of suspect Chinese seafood go unscreened. [International Herald Tribune] In agriculture, the serious money is in specialty work such as inseminating cows, trimming hooves, sheering sheep. [Boston Globe] Grocery stores installing recipe kiosks. Scan an item, and the machines spit out possible preparations, wine pairings, and more. [BakingBites.com] Amazon now selling fresh food online. Don't click away just yet, though. It's only available to residents of Mercer Island, Washington. [Slashfood]...
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U.S. health officials visit Beijing to talk food safety with Chinese government. This, after the recent string of tainted product scares. Officials on both sides want to devise ways to increase the flow of information about products and to come up with regulations that will govern production and transport. Meanwhile, Paris-based food chain Carrefour makes hay at locations in China by promoting itself as a safe alternative, with its in-store food-testing labs. FDA food-safety officials give their own department's inspections a flunking grade. But, hey, they're working on it, people....
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Right now, either head to your pantry or make a note to do so upon getting home tonight and toss any of the products listed here. They may be linked to four botulism outbreaks—two in Indiana and two in Texas....
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According to Reuters, the Chinese government has arrested the Chinese television reporter who allegedly fabricated the story of finding cardboard in the pork buns sold on the street in Beijing. Here's the scoop: A report directed by Beijing TV and played on state-run national broadcaster China Central Television last Thursday said an unlicensed snack vendor in eastern Beijing was selling steamed dumplings stuffed with cardboard soaked in caustic soda and seasoned with pork flavoring.Beijing authorities said investigations had found that an employee surnamed Zi had fabricated the report to garner "higher audience ratings", the China Daily said on Thursday. [via Serious Eater Prairie, in Talk]...
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With the priority that the Chinese place on food in their culture, it's a shame that the recent food scares have been tinged with a hint of racism, says Jeff Yang in the Washington Post: That's troubling, because it reinforces the notion that befouled food is the consequence of a foul culture. Chef and gustatory adventurer Anthony Bourdain may have said it best in a 2006 Salon interview in which he noted that there's "something kind of racist" about culinary xenophobia: "Fear of dirt is often indistinguishable from the fear of unnamed dirty people."...
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Just how porous is our imported-fish inspection process? Taras Grescoe says we should be very scared. Why? Because the FDA, which is responsible for fish inspections, physically inspects 1.34 percent of the imported fish containers that come into this country and tests just 0.59 percent. The European Union, on the other hand, inspects 20 percent of its imported fish containers. How is our wonderfully protective federal government dealing with this problematic situation? By cutting the budget for FDA in-country foreign fish inspections to zero!...
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