For many years, food safety experts have taken advantage of 4th of July barbecues to teach us how to grill food safely. It turns out, however, that it’s not the burgers that are going to make us sick, it’s the fixings — the lettuce and tomato toppers — or the side dishes of fresh vegetables and fruit that pose the greatest risk.
“Fresh fruits and vegetables are the most significant sources of foodborne illness today in the U.S.,” said Douglas Powell, an associate professor at Kansas State University and scientific director of the International Food Safety Network.
More than 800 people are sick from salmonella right now. The source may be tainted tomatoes — or maybe not — we know it’s something fresh, Powell continued.
Fresh fruits and vegetables are good for you and we need to eat more of them, but we need to as questions about how the food was grown and handled, he added.
Whether consumers buy produce from a farmers market or a giant grocery store chain, they should ask if growers test irrigation and wash water for bacteria, the type of soil amendments used and if employees and staff have been trained about proper hand washing.
Change comes about when consumers demand answers from local suppliers, those businesses ask their suppliers and it eventually gets back to where the food was raised. Change is occurring, Powell said, calling attention to a June 30 food safety article in the Dallas Morning News.
That story details procedures followed at Taylor Farms, which manages 800 workers who plant, harvest and package produce in Mexico for export to the U.S. Before lettuce picking starts, sanitized knives, gloves, hairnets, masks and aprons are distributed to field workers. An aide monitors workers coming out of mobile toilets at the end of the fields to make sure they wash their hands before returning to work. Heavy strips of yellow plastic keep out dogs, cattle and other livestock. Each box is marked with a bar code identifying the owner’s farm, crew supervisor, field and time of harvest, critical in tracing the product if a problem is discovered.
Contamination doesn’t just occur on giant farms, it can happen with local food and in a person’s own garden, Powell commented. His general rule is “keep the poop off the food.” Don’t allow dogs in the garden; they can be trained to stay out, he said. Cats are harder to train and “you can’t kill off all the birds,” but they are sources of contamination. Don’t garden next to a livestock handling facility, don’t use manure as a fertilizer and flood waters carry all sorts of bacteria.
Because fresh foods are not cooked, anything that comes in contact with it is a possible source of contamination. It makes sense to minimize bacteria in the growing stage, because “cross contamination (in the kitchen) is very easy to do,” he said.
People make a lot of mistakes (transferring bacteria from one food, especially raw meat, to another) without being aware, he said, and videotapes from the Food Network revealed a food-handling mistake every five minutes.
“I’ve got a PhD in this stuff and I make mistakes,” he admitted.
Roma tomatoes and round tomatoes, suspected as causes for the current salmonella outbreak, have been found to be safe and are back in the produce bins at Dillons, manager Jim Dickson said.
When a recall is issued, store managers receive e-mails to pull the food from shelves and instructions to either destroy it or hold it for testing. Compliance is required within a short time, and Dickson has to reply to his supervisor about procedures that have been followed.
There are always risks with fresh produce, Powell acknowledged. People must make their own decisions, based on as much information as possible.
Pratt, Kan. —
