Raspberries Top The New Food Preference List.

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By Bill Adler, MPH, RS
Technical Food Safety Consultant

Okay, it isn’t precisely a pyramid. But it is a valuation of foods that are good for you. And raspberries received a 100 point score, which is the best you can get. Already, however, there is controversy over which foods made the ‘good for you’ list and which ones didn’t. For example, some cereals are ranked higher than eggs. This is causing no end to arguments. But, as a consumer, my wallet and taste predict what I’ll buy over what is better for me, from time to time.

Raspberries are a superfood. I should know because I grow them! This is not to say I am a nutritionist because I’m not. But it does say I like raspberry jam on my toasted English muffins. Haha, this makes me human, I guess.

Raspberries have one colossal drawback, and that’s the tiny crevices between the berry segments. As a result, they collect all sorts of nasties, including dirt, bird droppings, pollutants wafting over the gardens, etc. Back in 2000, there was a wedding-related outbreak due to the parasite Cyclospora cayetanensis. Eventually, the association was made to raspberries grown in Guatemala.  I’ve seen pictures of the raspberry plants covered in bird droppings that were taken in Guatemala. It isn’t hard to believe some of those berries resulted in people getting sick because we like our berries fresh (uncooked) and served as an ingredient to salads, desserts, cereals, and fresh out of the garden.

Many of our favorite foods used to be seasonal. This is no longer the case. Looking at the Country of Origin label on fresh fruits and vegetables is surprising where our food comes from. Grapes, from January till early June, come from Central and South America. Other crops do, too.

Similarly, meats and fish are no longer just raised and processed by American producers. Sardines are caught and processed in the Philippines and Vietnam. Beef and farm-raised venison come from Australia and New Zealand. Fish and seafood might come from Canada and Belize. The American marketplace is a massive resource for producers around the world.

But, as far as fruits and vegetables are concerned, source identification doesn’t mean it is clean or safe. As consumers, it is our responsibility to ensure our safety as best we can. WASHING produce is a step in the right direction. Washing it in something beyond just water dissolves the dirt and removes organisms tucked in those nooks and crannies: places water alone may not do much. Our goal here at Life’s Pure Balance is to provide you with the means to make produce safer. By washing with the concentrated Fruit and Veggie Wash, you’ll be taking off contaminants on the outside, giving the produce a much better taste. So, Wash, rinse, and eat, knowing you did your best to make your table fare as clean as it can get.

Bill Adler is an expert in food safety, food-borne illnesses, and the foodservice inspection industry. He has conducted training for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), teaching local, state, and federal disease investigators as well as working with laboratory specialists and epidemiologists. In addition, Bill has worked extensively with the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) to perform food service inspections and train local and state public health employees.

A Fence or an Ambulance – You choose!

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By Bill Adler, MPH, RS
Technical Food Safety Consultant

A Fence on the Cliff, or an Ambulance in the Valley – a Poem by Joseph Mailns.

The origin of this poem goes back to 1895 and was originally titled “An Ambulance Down in the Valley.” I’ll let our readers look it up and enjoy their find.

When I worked in public health, I had a supervisor who had this poem taped to his file cabinet. It served to remind everyone that what we did, didn’t get headlines or was even appreciated. But it did perform the function of preventing something awful, instead of wringing hands (or necks) when the system failed, and we had sick people, hospitalizations, or even deaths due to hemolytic uremic syndrome—a side effect of E. coli.

If you’ve read enough of my pieces, you’ll know we’re all about prevention. Putting a fence on the cliff is far better than picking up bodies in the valley. Washing fruits and vegetables is an easy way to prevent the consumption of E. coli, Listeria, Salmonella, dirt containing many things, wax, and pesticides. That list goes on and on. Granted, it is not as traumatizing as making a plea on Facebook to fund a hospital stay or an entry in the Christmas newsletter talking about how awful it was to watch the kids trying to recover from something. But, of course, cleaning produce isn’t exciting at all. It’s hardly worth a footnote. But there is enough drama in our lives as it is. Having to watch our kids ‘praying at the porcelain altar’ shouldn’t have to be one of them.

Now, let’s talk a little about bacteria.

The Life’s Pure Balance Fruit and Veggie Wash removes a lot of what’s on the outside. Enough to make dirty produce into a safe item to eat. But it doesn’t sterilize it. NO fruit and veggie wash does that. Sterilization comes from cooking the daylights out of something to the point where nothing can live on or in it. Milk pasteurization doesn’t kill everything. Oven cooking at 450 deg F doesn’t either. A lot also depends on the immune systems of the people doing the consuming. However, you can wash off or cook food to the point where our bodies no longer ‘see’ or experience the bacteria as a threat. Size does make a difference, and in this case, size refers to the number of bacteria per gram of food we consume.

Medical studies have demonstrated just how much Salmonella it takes to make us sick. If we’re talking about a few hundred per gram of food, our bodies don’t seem to care. This dose is too small to cause a problem with Salmonella, no matter how old or young we are. But, if we’re talking a million or more to a gram of food, you better have the toilet paper ready. Shigella, on the other hand, only takes 100 organisms per gram of food. This is a bacterial disease investigators see too much of in daycare settings in Minnesota. It’s probably a national phenomenon, though many states don’t have as rigorous a disease investigative program as we have here.

Prevention is easier to stomach. We do it all the time. Kids today wear bicycle helmets to avoid ER visits. We wear seatbelts to be able to walk away from accidents that might kill us. Tobacco use has been curtailed because nobody likes premature deaths due to various cancers linked to tobacco exposure. Everyone I know is on a diet, presumably to live longer and get into their skinny clothes. Farm equipment has built-in guards to keep pant legs from getting wrapped up in the PTO mechanisms. OSHA requires face shields, goggles, and respirators/masks for working around flying grit from metal grinding jobs. Prevention isn’t just about what we eat. We accept ‘prevention’ mechanisms because we know it’s for our good to do so.

In the event you’ve missed our message, here it is:

  1. Properly washing fruits and vegetables with Life’s Pure Balance Fruit and Vegetable Wash concentrate makes them taste better and is safer to boot!
  2. Use a teaspoon of the concentrate in a gallon of water
  3. Soak your fruits and veggies in it for a couple of minutes
  4. Add a quick rinse under the tap or in a bowl of water
  5. Enjoy!

In a nutshell, you can prevent the need for an ambulance in the valley by putting your fence on the cliff. It’s not as glamorous or awful or giving you a story to tell, but it does give you better-tasting produce that is safer to eat. The bottom line: Wash your produce. It is the prevention that’s keeping you from needing an ambulance.

Bill Adler is an expert in food safety, food-borne illnesses, and the foodservice inspection industry. He has conducted training for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), teaching local, state, and federal disease investigators as well as working with laboratory specialists and epidemiologists. In addition, Bill has worked extensively with the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) to perform food service inspections and train local and state public health employees.

Do You Feel Like a Nut?

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By Bill Adler, MPH, RS
Technical Food Safety Consultant

Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut. Sometimes You Don’t!  Advertising jingles are cute and often stay in our memories. That’s the point. It’s an advertisement meant to stay with you right up to the point of sale. I wish we had a memorable jingle. Or a high-dollar advertising budget. Alas, we don’t. Instead, we put out interesting information on a website and during product demos that provide potential customers with the information they can use.

Some of it is a little off-putting because of the ramifications of not getting produce clean. However, our information isn’t ‘Steven King’ scary or designed to have you buy out of fear. Instead, we are trying to grab your attention with science-based facts that life isn’t always rosy, and our inactions have consequences. Our message is and continues to be that washing produce with Life’s Pure Balance Fruit and Vegetable Wash gives you a better tasting product that’s also much safer and better for you in the long run.

Does this leave a jingle in your mind? I doubt it. But we hope you remember the message that cleaning your food before eating is better for you.

Should you wash nuts? I honestly don’t know. Then too, I seriously don’t know how long bacteria persist on the dry surfaces of pecans, walnuts, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamia nuts, or any others. The nuts are dry at the surface and inside, making the environment inhospitable to bacteria and mold. But, this doesn’t mean it can’t be there. Peppercorns have been found to harbor Salmonella. However, the dose you get peppering your eggs is so tiny that our bodies generally don’t develop the urge to purge. Rice has been found to have Bacillus cereus on the surface, but this becomes a hazard only after the rice has been cooked (and mishandled). Flour can harbor Salmonella, but it only becomes a hazard if we eat it before cooking. Think raw cookie dough. Dry pasta isn’t a problem but becomes what restaurants call TCS food (Time and Temperature Controlled for Safety) once they’ve been hydrated during cooking.

Should canned foods be washed? Hmm, good question! Gene Wood, the LPB Fruit and Veggie Wash developer washes beans and corn and has reported improving the taste. Granted, he might be a little biased, but it was his unknowing relatives who pronounced his Texas caviar better than the rest. And all he did was wash the canned beans and corn.

But that brings up another topic: what is actually on canned produce, this is a topic for another blog post!

But, back to our message. It’s tried and true—no jingle or catchy phrase that’ll stick in your brain while you’re trying to sleep.

Wash your produce in a solution of LPB Fruit and Veggie Wash.

Rinse it off.

Enjoy the flavor knowing you’ve removed all sorts of gunk, both living and synthetic, that makes it unhealthy and robs you of the taste it should have.

Bill Adler is an expert in food safety, foodborne illnesses, and the foodservice inspection industry. He has conducted training for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) teaching local, state, and federal disease investigators as well as working with laboratory specialists and epidemiologists. Bill has worked extensively with the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) to perform food service inspections and train local and state public health employees.