Part of the drill at culinary school, indeed, the very first part, was sanitation. Keeping our workstations and the kitchen in general clean and sanitized during work and especially at the end of the shift was drummed into us day after day, and a critical part of this was the use of sanitizers and disinfectants. We learned about the killing power of chlorine bleach and ammonia among others - killing bacteria, mold, and mildew that is. We used these powerful chemicals in greatly diluted form, and the health department required that they be stored in their original containers in a separate area away from food storage and preparation to make sure all they would killed was bacteria, mold, and mildew.
Sanitation was stressed in every professional kitchen that I worked in after cooking school, but now things may need to change. It appears that Big Ag may be alleviating the need for sanitizing and disinfecting in the kitchen, since they are using chlorine and ammonia to process some of the most popular restaurant foods, hamburger and chicken. As a result of turning the raising and processing of cattle and chickens into massive industrial operations, these protein factories have become breeding grounds for deadly new strains of E. coli and Salmonella.
As pointed out in Safety of Beef Processing Method Is Questioned published in the NYT on December 30th, ammonia is now used in the production of hamburgers:
The company, Beef Products Inc., had been looking to expand into the hamburger business with a product made from beef that included fatty trimmings the industry once relegated to pet food and cooking oil. The trimmings were particularly susceptible to contamination, but a study commissioned by the company showed that the ammonia process (injecting beef with ammonia) would kill E. coli as well as salmonella.
As the piece pointed out, the company’s processed beef is used by mega fast food chains such as McDonalds and Burger King. And we used to worry about what they put in hot dogs!!!
As if that weren’t enough, would you like a little bleach with your chicken tenders? Just this week in Russia Seeks to Cleanse Its Palate of U.S. Chicken, the NYT reported on the Russian government’s attempts to use restrictions and quotas to eliminate the importation of American chickens. While the piece hints at games of international diplomacy, the stated reason is the lack of compliance with Russian safety requirements. You see, when Big Ag slaughters its chickens, they disinfect them with a chlorine bath, a procedure that was banned in the European Union in 2008 and in Russia on January 1st of this year. Since our burgers and chicken are being sanitized for us, I’m not sure we need to worry anymore. (Actually, I think Big Ag could avoid all of this questionable publicity about the presence and flavor of trace chemicals and arrange to have the mega fast food chains add chlorine bleach and ammonia to the soft drink dispensers killing two birds with one stone, by disinfecting the contaminated dispensers as they dispense, and by disinfecting our stomachs as we wash down the industrial burgers and chicken.)
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