AHA! Now I understand! In order to be safe, I must only eat McDonalds and Taco Bell!

Potatoes have had more problems than cheese? That one really surprised me. Unless they mean potato salad, though I'm guessing not. Who knew potatoes held a risk for contamination-- they are generally always quite well-cooked, and easy to wash or peel, so I thought that would offer some protection.

@Oranges w/ Cheese needs guidance: But no french fries, apparently!

I am rethinking my raw oyster and tuna ice cream.

@semanticantics: No tuna cream?!? (Please someone get that reference.)

Eggs, cheese, and ice cream really surprise me. I don't think I've once ever been sick on any of those. As long as eggs are cooked, they're safe I thought. Unless you leave your ice cream out on the counter for a couple days then eat it, seems like you should be fine. And I don't know how you'd get sick off cheese unless you left that out too.

You're going to have to pry eggs, tomatoes, ice cream and cheese out of my hands!

It's important to note that eating raw egg, or egg yolk is not dangerous in small amounts. By all means, get that carbonara and get your eggs sunny side up (the yolk is not fully cooked while the whites are). It's fine. Just don't eat them every day.

Who knew that greens were less safe than oysters? I guess it makes sense with all that commotion over spinach, but still, one would probably assume shellfish was pretty high on the list.

@formergr: That's what I didn't get about stuff you cook. I'm not gonna go mow on a raw potato or raw eggs. I cook that sh-- before I eat it.

Since when is tuna and oysters not meat?

@pecan 3.14159265: I love sunny side up! Especially when you can slosh your breakfast potatoes and toast in the runny bits.

@Jfielder23: Red meat. They're not red meat. They are meat in that they constitute the body or "edible portion" of something - but they're not red meat.

@semanticantics: My Potato and Sprouts twist ice cream is going to have to be reconsidered as well.

@pecan 3.14159265: I used to HATE sunny side up. I've gone more now for over easy because it keeps my eggs contained and I feel slightly safer - sort of like a well seared tuna steak.

@downwithmonstercable: Eggs used in egg nogs, ice creams, custards, etc. can sicken you if they aren't cooked to the right temperature.

@Oranges w/ Cheese needs guidance: Looks like you will need to hold the lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese on your orders as well.

While there, you'll also need to skip the Egg McMuffin, the Berry Parfait, the Milkshake, and the Sundae.

Just to be safe of course.

@pecan 3.14159265: Pasta carbonara....YUMMMMM...

@Oranges w/ Cheese needs guidance: I hate tuna steak! I hate the texture of raw fish. I used to hate sunny side up and over easy eggs, but now I love them, especially when the whites get a little crispy...and now I want breakfast.

@pecan 3.14159265: Chicken isn't meat, either...but the distinction you're making is correct.

@Jfielder23: They're seafood, and the handling and cooking tends to be different. Also, chicken and beef are (from my understanding) NOT regulated by the FDA, while seafood is.

@ShikhaCadimillac: Oh of course. Maybe I should just start eating spam exclusively?

Looks like I'm on a Snickers only diet.

This makes me cry.

Have you guys ever seen that daytime TV talk show where it's a bunch of doctors talking about illnesses and diseases? All they do is spout scare tactics and promote fear. Usually hocking a remedy in the meantime.

50,000 over 16 years is 3,125 cases a year. That's less than 10 per day. That (roughly) means that each one of these items gets one person ill a day.

There are 300 million people in the US. every day that you eat a berry, you have a 1/300,000,000 (0.000000003333) chance that you will get ill.

BUT!!! That's only if you divide the cases up equally.
Other than the top two, most have less than 3500 cases over the course of 15 years. (or, 233/year)

Some are even pointed out as being due to the consumers negligence:

7) Ice cream (74 outbreaks, 2594 reported cases of illness)
Almost half of all ice-cream outbreaks contained in CSPI's database occurred in private homes. This is most likely due to the use of undercooked eggs in homemade ice cream.

Consumer reports says:

This Top 10 list underscores the need for food safety reform

I have to disagree. I don't think there is enough evidence here that this is a big enough issue to undergo a massive reform.

Now, couple this with more evidence of issues in the industry and I might be swayed. This alone is not enough.

@pecan 3.14159265: I haven't had many, but I can understand your queasyness.

@Jfielder23:

I'm going to say ... forever. Seriously, snark aside, the seafood/meat dichotomy is pretty well established in the English-speaking world. A decewnt guide is this--if it's not found in any butcher shop, it's not meat.

@katstermonster: Personally, I don't understand why some of the MOST DANGEROUS FOODS (i.e. chicken and meat products) AREN'T regulated by the FDA.

@formergr: "Potatoes are grown in the soil, but they are always cooked before consuming. Outbreaks are linked to dishes, like potato salad, that can contain many ingredients and also a broad range of pathogens. More than 40 percent of potato outbreaks were linked to foods prepared in restaurants and food establishments (including grocery stores and delis)."

So it's probably more the stuff with the potatoes.

@downwithmonstercable: Are you eating fresh cheeses made with unpasteurized milk? If not, then the chances of getting sick of cheese are pretty low.

When I lived in Peru, people often got sick from eating the ice cream at the ice cream shop - turns out that to save energy, they would unplug the freezers at night, and then when they came back in in the morning, they'd plug them back in. There's a good way to get ill from ice cream, you know, if you're curious. Eeeee. I mostly have a gut of steel though - I never had a problem.

@Oranges w/ Cheese needs guidance: All hail the gelatinous ooze!

@subtlefrog: So, spuds were framed, in other words.

@Eustace Silly: Did they base it on the amount consumed or the amount of people that got sick from them? Because more people eat greens than will eat oysters.

@Jfielder23: Real America™ looks askance at sea critters. It's too... French.

I don't trust ANYTHING that the Center for Science in the Public Interest comes out with.

Why?

1994: [www.cspinet.org]
They make their case against movie theatres using coconut oil in popcorn. So they stop.

2003: [coconutoil.com]
Coconut oil leads to higher HDL and better HDl to LDL ratios. Basically coconut oil is good for us.

Unless you work for the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

It's along the same lines as ignoring the worst insurance to have for medical reasons if you're afraid they'll deny a claim. (hint: it's not a private company)

@Saboth: i assume you forgot about all the peanut-related recalls over the past year

@bornonbord: What you say is true: I think the most telling point is actually about ice cream, in which it says, "This is most likely due to the use of undercooked eggs in homemade ice cream" - the risk of you getting sick can surely be partially attributed to mistakes of you as a cook or the chefs at any restaurant you go to.

Undercooked is undercooked, whether in your kitchen or at a restaurant serving undercooked custard for $20. It's important that one differentiates safe food handling practices by the food industry and the stupid mistakes by human beings in the kitchen.

@bornonbord: What you say is true: I agree with most of what you say except that when there are outbreaks with things like greens (think back to the spinach outbreaks, e.g.) - they are things like salmonella and things that can be devastating to the very young and the very old. And these are totally preventable - they are generally due to poor hygiene in the food chain. Salmonella doesn't naturally occur on spinach.

It would be nice to see some hygiene reform to prevent this sort of contamination. I don't particularly love the idea of getting some random worker's or cow's (depending on the source of contamination) shit on my food simply due to poor hygiene regulation. You may say - well wash it! Oh, I do. But bacterial contamination is notoriously difficult to fully remove. So that's where I'm coming from.

@bornonbord: What you say is true: I'd like to see an end to the Factory Farming practice of washing massive amounts of greens in the same huge vats without maintaining cleanliness standards (huge, crippling fines and the upper 10% of the errant processors' execs forced to eat 6 raw eggs left out in the sun for 20 days).
But besides that, you've a very good point.

@katstermonster: mind explaining why chicken (and i'm going to assume you meant all poultry) isn't meat?
i understand that it isn't RED meat, and i also understand that walnut meat isn't "meat"...
but i see chicken (as well as shrimp, fish, cows, etc) as having edible muscle tissue, therefore being meat.

@Trai_Dep: Damn, Trai. If you ever rule the world, remind me to stay on your good side.

@pecan 3.14159265: Ahh... I see now. That makes sense.

I suspect it's not so much the end product that makes it to the table but the methods used in producing them that lead to illness. Even for US sourced food there are clearly issues. If the spinach recall from a few years back didn't raise any flags consider these issues:

Meat processing waste, manure and untreated water are often used to fertilize leafy vegetables, tomatoes, etc. Eggs carry salmonella, especially on the shells--improper handling can lead to illness. Improperly pasteurized milk occasionally makes it into ice cream. And don't get me started on shellfish... how do you know those oysters weren't harvested from a bed in the runoff zone from an open sewer line? Do you know exactly how much shellfish served in this country is actually imported from SE Asia, where sanitary conditions are not the same as in North America?

It's not the food itself that's the danger it's the industrial methods used to produce it that are.

@subtlefrog: Yeah I guess I usually stick with pasteurized cheeses. I think. Actually, I don't even check. I'm curious now though. Are brie, feta, and bleu pasteurized? I'm pretty sure the tillamook cheddar is though...

@subtlefrog: Ah, thanks. I probably should have read the link :)

@ShruggingGalt: CoconutOil.com is hosted and run by Mt. Banahaw Health Products Corp., who has a vested interest in keeping coconut oil on the shelves as it is a producer of coconut oil cultivated from the Phillipines. Of course it's going to mitigate the claims that coconut oil isn't good for you.

By the way, the company also owns Coconut-Info.com and Coconutdiet.com.

All of the sites look like a 10 year old in the mid-90s went to town with a free Angelfire account, and they look shady to boot.

@subtlefrog: Really?? they just unplugged the freezers?

I would think the ice cream would then start to look, feel, taste different wouldn't it?

@Trai_Dep: No, they're guilty by association.

Wow, some of my favorite foods. In fact, I'm about to go eat some toro (raw tuna belly) that has been sitting in my fridge for a few days.

@Trai_Dep: and cute, you know the way you can put the appetizer in their little hands. and then just start in on them once their mitts are empty.

@gStein: nothing to eat anymore with all these lists. well except...nah nevemind I quit the british navy.

Sorry british folks.

@Trai_Dep: Just thinking about the eggs made me kinda retch.