Food in the News

A Potpourri of Food-Related News about Chicken Breasts, Pop Bottles, and Bologna

ChickenChicken breasts: Do you want them delicious or dry?

 

I’ve been saying it for years, and now an expert food writer, a newspaper columnist, has agreed with me: boneless, skinless chicken breasts are not as good as those with skin and bone intact.  The title to  JeanMarie Brownson’s  article (in the “Good Eating” section of the Chicago Tribune) says it all: “Bone up on chicken: forget boneless cuts if it’s flavor and moistness you are after.” Yes, I know.  When the bone and skin are removed, so are some calories. But then, to enjoy that dry, tasteless hunk of white meat, it’s necessary to douse it in many gobs of sauce (which is likely to add many more calories).

Some March Recalls: “Jamwich,” Peanut Butter, Garbanzo Beans, Ground Beef, Spaghetti and Meatballs, Nuts, and Flasks

food recallThis month’s recalls are a good indicator of the wide range of reasons that products are recalled.  Some of these may strike you as a bit humorous, but food-borne illness is no joke.  If you have any of these products, go to the link and check to see if your product matches the code in the recall.  If it does, dispose of the product, following the instructions from the manufacturer.

The Latest Ice Cream Flavor—Made with Human Milk

ice creamWould you pay $23 (14 British pounds) for one serving of ice cream? That will be the price if you want the exotic experience of tasting breast milk ice cream.  But wait.  It could get even more expensive: you’ll have to go to London to buy it.

Expired Food—Is It on Your Grocer’s Shelves?

Expiration Date You won’t turn green from eating it, but why buy food that’s past its prime?

 

Shelf life was actually front page news very recently—on the first page of the Chicago Tribune’s business section.  Here’s the story:  Shopping at Dominick’s (a supermarket chain), Jill Cataldo (a well-known Chicago-area coupon blogger) said she found 761 expired items during  various shopping trips, and some of the items were really antiques, with “use by” dates going back to 2008.  Cataldo has been hearing about this problem for more than a year now, she says—from her blog readers and from students in her coupon classes. On Facebook, Dominick’s has been receiving a lot of angry comments from customers who have taken home expired food.

Pyrex—What’s this? A Lesson in Safety?

pyrexIf you saw the full-page Pyrex ad in the February 6, 2011 issue of Parade magazine, you might have found it puzzling.  Why, instead of spending a zillion advertising dollars to display and talk up the company’s products, did the company choose to give instructions in glass cookware safety?  Coming from a company that has been repeatedly sued for what’s been called on the Internet “exploding Pyrex,” this ad can only be interpreted as damage control.

A Slave To Chocolate

cocoa beans From Valentine’s Day well past Easter, most of us cannot avoid the scent and resist the taste of chocolate.  It’s prominently displayed in stores; we buy it and/or receive it as a gift; once the box is open, the candies just seem to pop out of their designated squares and into our mouths. Then the guilt sets in.  For some people, guilt relates to cholesterol or weight worries.  Others have pangs of social conscience because they’ve heard that consumers of chocolate are actually supporting slavery.

FDA Confiscates Bravo Cheeses Made with Raw Milk

goudaIt began as an alert, soon escalated to a recall, and now has resulted in a government seizure of more than 80,000 lbs. of cheese.  The cheeses involved were Bravo Farms’ Gouda, Edam, and white cheddar. What was wrong with the cheeses?  The recall, in November, 2010, came after Bravo’s Dutch–style Gouda (produced in Traver, California) was linked to a 5-state E. coli outbreak that sickened 38 people (some of whom are suing Bravo and the stores that sold them a Bravo product).

Two Recalls—One Silly, One Serious

food recallLet’s start with the funny one.  It sounds like a joke, but it isn’t.  Still, feel free to laugh since no illnesses have been reported from it.  The name of the product being recalled is—I kid you not—Toxic Waste® Nuclear Sludge® Chew Bars.  Mouth-watering moniker, no?  This item is imported from Pakistan, so perhaps something got lost in translation.

 

What’s wrong with these chew bars? In a word, lead.  Imagine that—lead in your sludge. The lead was found in only one flavor, the cherry (due to the red dye), but that’s more than enough. One lot was found to have .24 parts per million; the FDA acceptable limit is .1 parts per million.  Lead, of course, has the potential to cause health problems, especially for infants, young children, and pregnant women.

In the Works: An Ingenious Way to Identify Expired Food

expiration dateIt’s an international problem continuously in search of a solution.  Some folks forget to discard (or don’t recognize) spoiled food; others, fearing contamination, throw out perfectly good food.  Now “smart” packaging—which tells consumers when their food is going bad—is being developed by researchers in Glasgow, Scotland. 

Food-borne Illness Estimates Decline Significantly—Why?

phone surveyAlmost every morning, my computer wakes up to news of a food recall.  (On December 29th, it was contaminated J&D Produce; on December 31, it was First Class Foods organic ground beef.)  Therefore, my computer blinked in surprise when a link led it to the astonishing announcement that the estimate of annual food-borne illness cases in the U.S. had suddenly DECLINED by about 1/3.  Is the U.S. food supply actually getting safer?  Not really.  According to Dr. Glenn Morris, director of the University of Florida’s Emerging Pathogens Institute, “Things are not getting better, but they’re not getting worse either.”  So why the big drop?  The explanation lies in the word “estimate.”

 

 
 

You must be logged in to post a comment or question.

Sign In or Register for free.