Beef processors' dirty secrets exposed; what next?

Corrective action (4.00 / 1)

How best can we protect public health while keeping an industry economically viable?  Please respond in the comments with any suggestions you may have - from the standpoint of consumer, producer or processor - for structuring a food safety system.

What is the point of suggestions for corrective action as long as the department is run by assholes like this:

Dr. Kenneth Petersen, an assistant administrator with the department's Food Safety and Inspection Service, said that the department could mandate testing, but that it needed to consider the impact on companies as well as consumers. "I have to look at the entire industry, not just what is best for public health," Dr. Petersen said.

Nevertheless this needs to be corrected:

A recent industry test in which spiked samples of meat were sent to independent laboratories used by food companies found that some missed the E. coli in as many as 80 percent of the samples.

No laboratory should be able to receive samples unless it has been certified by a proficiency program administered by an agency that is independent of USDA.

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by: count @ Sun Oct 04, 2009 at 23:49:54 PM UTC

I think the best way to keep this pathogen (4.00 / 3)

out of the stores, homes and restaurants is to test and hold. That is to say, test the ground meat and hold the product in storage untill the test comes back.

Personally, I haven't eaten any ground beef or pork from the store in over 6 months. I keep a store of those meats and sausages in the freezer, and when I run out, if my supplier is out for the moment, then I don't make what ever recipes call for hamberger or suasage.

But even at that, even as much as I trust my supplier, I understand that you can't catch everything. No plan, no matter how well thought out, will catch 100% of everything. So I still use caution in handling meats, cooking them, etc.

The only meats that I know for sure are absolutely as safe as can be are the ones from animals that I processed myself.

I think that we need to get rid of the illusion that our food is safe. I think that, in addition to taking extra measures in processing and making sure that existing regulations are actually enforced, and then on top of that, the consumer has to start assuming that the meats may still be contaminated, and act accordingly. Of course that won't promote those meats very well.

I get so sick of this mantra - "We have the safest food in the world". Oh, if that's true, why is it that people in Ethiopia are eating raw camel slaughtered next to a podunk little meat market and sold without refrigeration and those people don't get sick eating it, but we have the highest of the high tech slaughter, pathogen testing, etc. and we have people getting sick and recalls all over the place? Hmmm? 'Splain that one to me Lucy.....

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 01:21:11 AM UTC

Indeed (4.00 / 1)

The mantra of "safest food in the world" lulls consumers into complacency and undermines what passes for consumer education i.e., recommending sanitary procedures that are inadequate to kill a pathogen.  However, I cannot recall any food safety official ever being put on the spot after making the "safest" claim by a reporter saying, "Prove it!"

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by: Deep Harm @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 01:55:07 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

We cannot have (4.00 / 2)

both the cheapest food in the world and the safest food in the world. The two concepts are contradictory and incompatible.

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 02:13:38 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Well, in some ways we can (4.00 / 2)

as far as some types of meats are concerned. Raising and slaughtering the animal yourself is going to yield the safest, cheapest meat. I like raw beef and emu. While I don't do beef as we don't raise them here (although that might change with the addition of a couple veal calves next spring), we do have the emus. I don't hesitate to eat a bit of raw emu becuase I raised the animals myself, and help Harold slaughter them, and then I do the cutting and wrapping. I know for a fact that the meat's clean.

Buying from a single producer, having the animal slaughtered on farm, and aged, cut and wrapped per your specs is about as safe as it's going to get short of doing that all yourself. Around here you're going to pay around $3/lbs for beef bought that way. That's NY steak at hamburger prices. It just don't get no cheaper'n that.

But you're right in that having the safest food in the world and the cheapest don't necessarily go together if you're sourcing from the big commodity markets.

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 03:17:12 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Limiting sourcing seems to be a key element of a good food safety system (4.00 / 1)

Accountability becomes increasingly difficult as the number of sources increase and, importantly, the time required to track down the source increases, meaning more people can get sick as the investigation drags on.

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by: Deep Harm @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 12:49:10 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

It's incomprehensible (4.00 / 1)

that USDA tolerates a system that makes it impossible to identify the source of an outbreak. Reprehensible and inexcusable.

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 12:52:31 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Your comment (4.00 / 2)

(farther up) reminded me of another situation:  raw-milk cheeses.

I've been to France.  I've eaten raw-milk cheeses, and other foods, that would be illegal here on "health safety" grounds.

Did I get sick?  No.  

Am I afraid of ground beef here?  Yes.  I am also somewhat worried about mad cow disease, ever since Dubya refused to let that beef exporter in Kansas use the so-called gold standard test for mad cow so the exporter could continue to export its beef to Japan, which has much higher standards than our country does.

The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found. -- Calvin Trillin

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by: Youffraita @ Tue Oct 06, 2009 at 07:08:56 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

raw milk cheese (0.00 / 0)

Raw milk cheese is not illegal in the U.S., is it? The last time I bought cheese (quite a while ago) I'm pretty sure I saw raw milk cheese in the case (here in Baltimore.)

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by: count @ Tue Oct 06, 2009 at 12:22:00 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Fresh raw milk cheese is illegal to produce for sale (4.00 / 2)

if I remember my regs right, but it's not as simple as that because the laws vary from state to state. For instance, in Oregon you can sell raw milk cheeses as long as they're aged for a minimum of 6 months, but I can make raw milk cheese from my own goats' milk, or buy raw milk from someone else's farm, make fresh cheese from it and give it away to whom ever I choose.

In other states, Virginia I think is one, I can have a dairy animal, and drink the raw milk, but it's illegal to make butter or cheese even for my own consumption. Go figure. I'm sure that's one law that's broken on a regular basis, both on purpose and by those who don't even know the law exists.

For interstate sales you'd have to look those regs up at USDA or FSIS.

In Oregon you can sell raw milk as long as you have no more than a maximum number of animals and don't advertise, I think people also have to come to the farm to pick up the milk. In California, you can be a large dairy and be licensed to sell raw fluid milk (if you can thread yourself through the health requirements). When we got Loiosh, because he was so young and not weaned, I had to buy raw goat's milk at the store for him as part of his ration. That was 19 years ago. Today I'd challenge anyone to find raw milk of any kind in the store. I don't know if Oregon licenses dairies to sell raw milk or not. All I can find is pasturized and ultra-pasturized.

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Tue Oct 06, 2009 at 15:29:24 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I worry, too, about mad cow disease (4.00 / 2)

There has been little mention of it over the past few years, although similar brain diseases, easily confused for one another, are increasing in incidence.

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by: Deep Harm @ Tue Oct 06, 2009 at 16:02:27 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

SOI (4.00 / 1)

USDA should change the Standard of Identification for ground beef and fresh hot-dog-type food from 30% fat to 20% fat. While we're at it, lets change the standard for fresh sausage from 50% to, say, 35% fat? We are talking about cow dung and bull shit, after all. The less edible waste ground into our food supply, the safer it would be, right?

Chili's, Outback Steakhouse, and Perkin's already use 20% fat. Bob Evans, Denny's, and Ruby Tuesday use 25%. McDonald's and Burker King refused to supply the information when asked, but from macronutrient data published by McD for the Quarter Pounder (19 grams protein), I estimate that McDonald's uses about 25%, at least for that one product.

Burker King just flat out lies, I think. BK Whopper That ingredient list cannot possibly provide that much protein (29 grams), noway nohow.

A producer can make about 7% more patties from 75% ground beef than from 80% ground beef, and the patties are cheaper. That's a powerful driver for the bottom line in a cheapest-at-all-costs industry.

I don't know this to be true, but I would bet that the school nutrition program buys 30% edible waste meat. A producer can make about 14% more patties from 70% ground beef than from 80% ground beef, and the patties are the cheapest allowed by law. (From a nutritional point of view, a student might ingest about the same amount of fat from both patties, because a lot of fat should drain off of the 70% patty. She would get about 20% more protein, however.)

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 02:35:37 AM UTC

Interesting (4.00 / 1)

that number from Burger King (my favorite fast food burger joint) does look a bit high on the protein. I went over to About.com's Calorie Count website. I can look up the stats on the individual components in a Whopper. The 3 oz. patty by itself should be 19.9g of protein if it's a 75/25 patty, Burger King's website says that the whopper's patty is 20 grams, so that sounds right. A 4.5 inch bun, which I think is what's on a whopper, it's been a while, has 5 grams of protein right there. Burger King's website says there is 8 grams of protein in the bun. that sounds a bit high, but then I don't know what kind of flour they're using. It does sound a bit high for that size of bun. Maybe they're bigger buns than I remember.....

I see by adding and subtracting ingredients on their website that they figure every condiment except pickles on a regualr sandwich as subtracting 1 gram of protein. Unless that is, you subtract all of the condiments, then all of them combined drop the protein content of the sandwich 2 full grams.

I'm thinking that the people who came up with these numbers are spit balling the little stuff and maybe padding their numbers. But either way, I think they're only 2-3 grams high.  

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 03:56:49 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

How did you find (0.00 / 0)

individual components at the BK site? I haven't been able to figure that out.

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 04:16:14 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

If you look at the BK site on the sandwiches (4.00 / 1)

each one will have the component icons below the pic of the sandwich you're investigating. There's a triangle above and one below each icon. Click the arrow and you'll see the nutrient values change, either up or down depending on whether you add or subtract a serving of condiment. If you click the plus icon at the end of the base set of condiments/components, it'll give you a pop up menu where you can add additional components, or subtract any you've added.

It's actually a fairly good tool for anyone interested in customizing a sandwich. For instance, Harold likes hamburgers, but the bread runs his blood sugar up. When we make burgers at home he usually has his between two leaves of cabbage, or just has the patty on the plate with the lettuce, tomato, onions, on the side. He does that for regular sandwiches with deli meat too.

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 04:26:42 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Hah! (4.00 / 1)

Cooperative research is great. That was not at all obvious to me. Thank you.

Yes, the high value for the bun is what throws me off. I'm not a bread expert, though.

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 04:35:32 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Perhaps, follow the French system? (4.00 / 1)

From what I have heard, French authorities have a strict classification system that lets consumers know what they are buying:  a quality product or the bare minimum.

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by: Deep Harm @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 12:44:31 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Do you know (4.00 / 1)

who grinds meat for various junk food companies? If Costco grinds theirs, perhaps other retailers do also?

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 12:50:00 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

That's a good question (4.00 / 2)

USDA allows companies to withhold much of the information about their suppliers and processes by claiming the it comprises "trade secrets."  If that doesn't wash, companies can always claim transparency exemptions under Bush era regulations means to protect "critical infrastructure" from terrorists.  But, as I pointed out to FSIS in 2004, terrorists don't need to break into a US food plant in order to kill people.  They simply have to buy one.

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by: Deep Harm @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 13:03:46 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

There are all sorts of futher processors (4.00 / 3)

around. I don't know how to go about finding out who's grinding for whom, very easily. I was able to find out who Safeway sources the beef for their Ranchers Reserve brand - Cargill, but for the other companies, who knows.

It's my understinding that much if not most ground beef produced in the USA comes from bench trim. Those are the trimings that result from the fabrication of steaks, roasts, etc. When you look at a beef carcass there's a lot of fat on it, a lot of which is trimmed off when the steaks are cut from the primals. There are lots of videos on YouTube showing various methods of trimming and fabrication. If you watch them you'll see how much is trimmed off to make the steaks and roasts we're all familiar with. That trim is needed for making ground meats, which also go into making salamis, salumis, etc.

When we butcher an emu out here, I debone the meat, seperate the large muscles and cut the big parts of them into medalions, the rest goes to stew meat or gets stripped into stirfry meat. We do the same with deer and elk if, ahem, Harold manages to get one.....which isn't often. I know of a lot of people who have a lot of the animals they harvest ground for sausage, etc., but personally I think that's a low use for higher end cuts. I debone and cut for medalions because we don't have a food grade bandsaw, which you really need to produce steaks.

Bench trim comes from all over the world. If you look at your country of origin labels on muscle cuts, you'll most likely see one or more of only 3 countries - USA, Canada, Mexico, because those are the 3 countries where live animals are slaughtered from and from where muscle cuts of meats come from that you'll find in your grocery store. However, beef and veal (fresh and frozen) was sourced from no less than 14 foreign countries by importers in the USA between 2004 and 2008, although how much of that was bench trim I don't know. I do know that one further processor who had a large recall of ground beef for some pahtogen (I forget which one) was sourcing from either Uruguay or Nicaraugua, and that all or most of the ground beef in the recall was from one of those countries.

Argentina - last shipments in 2004
Australia, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic - last shipments in 2004, Honduras, India - last shipments in 2004, apan, Mexico, Netherlands (2008 first shipments), nicaraugua, New Zealand, Uruguay.

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 15:19:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Low use for high end cuts (4.00 / 1)

Once upon a time, a guy in Kalispell, Montana made cooked sausage for hunters. Best use of meat ever. When he died, his secrets went with him, alas. That man was a genius.

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by: count @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 21:26:07 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Perhaps, incorporate elements of the French system? (4.00 / 2)

Reportedly, France has a strict food quality grading system that at least lets consumers know what they are getting for their money.

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by: Deep Harm @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 12:51:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

heh...that would NEVER (4.00 / 2)

get an "okay" here:  our (GOPer) politicians hate the French, and even French fries (actually invented in Belgium, iirc, but Americans have never been very good at geography, or even readin' writing' &...what else starts w/an r?).  ;-D

On a more serious note:  I have never worried about what I was eating in France.  But here, every time I cave in to the desire for a burger I feel like I'm risking my life.

And that was before the Sunday Times page 1 above-the-fold story about that poor woman.

The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found. -- Calvin Trillin

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by: Youffraita @ Tue Oct 06, 2009 at 07:19:08 AM UTC

[ Parent ]