Do not eat that bagged spinach!

[chezcherie]

i was thinking about this too, and my suspicion is that because the bagged spinach is sometimes "triple washed", people don't wash it, and then consume it raw...whereas they will usually wash the non-bagged stuff.

as mimi sheraton posted above, cooking would eliminate most if not all of the danger. washing would also help.

i'm not the most type A kitchen person, but i have been (re)washing the "triple washed" lettuce mixes i use for some time now, for just this reason!

[docsconz]

According to NBC's Today Show, if the e. coli was in the irrigation water and that water and e.coli is absorbed into the plant, simple washing of the spinach would not be sufficient to remove the e.coli. I still don't understand why they are not simply recommending that the spinach be cooked! That should be sufficient to do the job as Mimi mentioned above. While this strain of e.coli is quite serious if one gets infected with it, this strikes meas more hysterical over-reaction - not that therre are warnings, but of the extreme nature of the warnings. I believe that this is another manifestation of issues of liability, this time affecting our food supply. No one wants to take the chance that someone might still get this strain of e.coli. It is easier just to say to avoid the product altogether than worry about whether people would heed warnings.

[Parmhero]

Here's an updated report on CNN:

Spinach & E. coli on CNN

Health chiefs: Don't eat bagged spinach

POSTED: 11:00 a.m. EDT, September 15, 2006

[Andrew Fenton]

I still don't understand why they are not simply recommending that the spinach be cooked! That should be sufficient to do the job as Mimi mentioned above.

It's a lot easier to tell people to just throw out a bag of spinach than to explain about cooking it; that's especially true if the spinach in question is the baby kind that's marketed as salad greens. If I were NBC or the FDA or whoever, I'd rather have people throw out a $3 bag of spinach than risk being confused and getting sick, or dying.

Edited September 15, 2006 by Andrew Fenton (log)

[misstenacity]

Let's say that the products contaminated span several brands, as it's likely they are all packaged in the same facility. So it is affecting one major farm of spinach.

How about "bagged" (really boxed) Organic spinach? Seems that would have to come from a completely different farm and would therefore not be affected....?

Hmm. On the washing thing, NOT washing fresh spinach is exactly the reason I get the packaged stuff. You have no idea how much time and water are used up to get the fresh stuff really clean. Ick.

Andrea

http://tenacity.net

[docsconz]

I still don't understand why they are not simply recommending that the spinach be cooked! That should be sufficient to do the job as Mimi mentioned above.

It's a lot easier to tell people to just throw out a bag of spinach than to explain about cooking it; that's especially true if the spinach in question is the baby kind that's marketed as salad greens. If I were NBC or the FDA or whoever, I'd rather have people throw out a $3 bag of spinach than risk being confused and getting sick, or dying.

←

Andrew, that is precisely the reason I wrote the last three sentences of my post that you didn't quote. The reality though is that they are giving out misinformation and contributing to a mass hysteria so as to avoid the potential for liability.

[Deldino]

Whew! I am safe - I cooked mine in tomato sauce and served with whole wheat pasta and chicken sausage.

[jgm]

Hmmph. I've already caught the going-around-the-office crud from a certain co-worker; WWIII is currently being waged in my belly. What are the chances that those already heavily-armed bugs will kill of the ones on the spinach?

[memesuze]

so, I normally wash/scrub my produce with a soap product and water, while merely rinsing leafy greens - and don't buy bagged spinach or other greens, but if I were, do I plunge them in a soapy water solution and mush them around with my hands? or is there another way to wash leafy greens? perhaps I should put this in the absurdly stupidly simple cooking questions thread....

[Nina C.]

From a pediatrician friend

I guess they are worried that someone might not cook it enough and still get sick or that they might not wash their hands well while preparing it for cooking.

One of those better safe than sorry things, I suppose.

[Andrew Fenton]

I still don't understand why they are not simply recommending that the spinach be cooked! That should be sufficient to do the job as Mimi mentioned above.

It's a lot easier to tell people to just throw out a bag of spinach than to explain about cooking it; that's especially true if the spinach in question is the baby kind that's marketed as salad greens. If I were NBC or the FDA or whoever, I'd rather have people throw out a $3 bag of spinach than risk being confused and getting sick, or dying.

←

Andrew, that is precisely the reason I wrote the last three sentences of my post that you didn't quote. The reality though is that they are giving out misinformation and contributing to a mass hysteria so as to avoid the potential for liability.

←

You say "liability", I say "concern for people's lives". I think there's a difference there; but let's call the whole thing off.

[mizducky]

Here's an updated report on CNN:

Spinach & E. coli on CNN

Health chiefs: Don't eat bagged spinach

POSTED: 11:00 a.m. EDT, September 15, 2006

←

Sigh. I find this article, like the previously linked one (both off the AP wire) to be sufficiently unclear as to only further confuse the public and add to the hysteria. They go to great lengths this time around to emphasize that washing suspect spinach won't remove the bug. Then later on they say that if consumers are worried about their other fresh produce, they should wash that--with no explanation in the article about why that works for the other produce when it doesn't work for spinach. (Plus, yeah, many a foodie is going to go "warm water? but I was taught to wash veggies in cold water!").

Plus you have to read on a ways to get the info that thorough cooking kills the bug--and it's in a paragraph about produce in general, possibly leading confused readers (like me) to go "okay, but does cooking kill the bug on the spinach? You just said washing doesn't remove the bug from spinach but recommend washing for other produce, so is spinach an exception to the cooking rule too? And what the hell does 'thorough cooking' mean, anyway? Five minutes? Five hours? What temperature?" If home canning directions were that vague, we'd have people dropping from botulism left and right.

What especially irks me (as a writer for science websites who frequently finds errors in newspaper "science" articles) is knowing there's probably some poor shlemiel at the AP desk churning out these confusingly-written news items without a thought to their effect on a nervous readership. No wonder the FDA is erring on the side of extreme caution and just telling folks to avoid all bagged spinach, period--they probably realize the difficulty of getting a more detailed message out to the public without it getting garbled en route.

(Edited to insert correct TLA)

Edited September 15, 2006 by mizducky (log)

[docsconz]

I still don't understand why they are not simply recommending that the spinach be cooked! That should be sufficient to do the job as Mimi mentioned above.

It's a lot easier to tell people to just throw out a bag of spinach than to explain about cooking it; that's especially true if the spinach in question is the baby kind that's marketed as salad greens. If I were NBC or the FDA or whoever, I'd rather have people throw out a $3 bag of spinach than risk being confused and getting sick, or dying.

←

Andrew, that is precisely the reason I wrote the last three sentences of my post that you didn't quote. The reality though is that they are giving out misinformation and contributing to a mass hysteria so as to avoid the potential for liability.

←

You say "liability", I say "concern for people's lives". I think there's a difference there; but let's call the whole thing off.

←

It is because of liablity concerns that the easy road is taken and everyone is told to simply throw it out rather than cook it safely. That doesn't mean to imply that I think they are not concerned for people's lives. I also don't mean to imply that it is their fault that the easy road is taken or that given our current environment that it is not a reasonable stance to take. I live within that world every day. It is certainly beyond the scope of this topic to discuss the general world of liability and its effects on this thread so I too will call this off.

[mizducky]

And now I finally bothered to play that Sanjay Gupta video linked to on the CNN site, and Sanjay's saying to not even bother cooking the suspect bagged spinach let alone wash it, just throw it all out. (No info as to why cooking doesn't work on the spinach, or from whom he's getting the cooking-doesn't-help advisory.)

Especially given that you have to sit through a damfool commercial in order to even get to that video clip, how many consumers are going to bother? It would have been a lot more helpful if they'd put that important info upfront and center in the text article.

[docsconz]

And now I finally bothered to play that Sanjay Gupta video linked to on the CNN site, and Sanjay's saying to not even bother cooking the suspect bagged spinach let alone wash it, just throw it all out. (No info as to why cooking doesn't work on the spinach, or from whom he's getting the cooking-doesn't-help advisory.)

Especially given that you have to sit through a damfool commercial in order to even get to that video clip, how many consumers are going to bother? It would have been a lot more helpful if they'd put that important info upfront and center in the text article.

←

If cooking doesn't work on the spinach then this is a big problem indeed. I have seen no confirmation or suggestion of this other than from what you just posted.

[patticky]

Maybe it's an especially deadly type of bacteria, so the normal washing won't help. The hospitalization rate is close to 50%. I picked this up from The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

FRIDAY, Sept. 15, 2006, 2:28 p.m.

By Karen Herzog

UPDATE: 30 E. coli cases in Wisconsin

The total number of E. coli cases in the state of Wisconsin is up to 30, including 17 hospitalizations and one death, according to Paul Biedrzycki, the Milwaukee Health Department's manager of disease control and prevention.

He said that an E. coli outbreak usually results in having 3% to 8% of people who are affected hospitalized. However, the latest outbreak of the bacteria linked to bagged spinach has resulted in a hospitalization rate closer to 50%.

Click here for more information from the state on the E. coli outbreak.

[johnder]

Looks like you can at New York to the list now -- CNN breaking news:

New York became the 11th state with confirmed cases Friday.

[Milagai]

The time.com site has an article with a little more detail:

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,...1535476,00.html

1. Washing alone will not get rid of the bacteria

lurking in cut and torn surfaces, stalks, etc.

2. Cooking at 160 deg F (though they don't say for how long)

will kill the bacteria.

Milagai

[patticky]

We have a case here in Schenectady and another in a nearby county. I've lost my appetite for baby spinach quickly sauteed in olive oil. Never thought that would happen.

[Kent D]

Big decision here -- do I eat healthy food, and possibly succumb rather quickly to multi-organ failure, or eat crap and possibly die a slow painful atherosclerotic death in 30 years...

They pulled the spinach in Walmart and Dillons stores today, and are urging people who bought bagged spinach to return it for a refund. The funny thing is, they always call a recall long after most people have already consumed the product in question.

And after all, only one person's actually DIED from eating tainted spinach...one person died in that other thread from eating marshmallows, and I don't see them recalling THEM...

[BuzzDraft]

They've traced it to the unfortunately named "Natural Selection Foods" in California. Talk about natural selection...

The organic movement bemuses me. Just because new food processes involve advanced technologies, like irradiating products to kill these bacteria, doesn't mean you will consume residual radiation too and are going to get cancer.

I welcome high tech approaches to making our food supply safer. Organic means I'm at the mercy of mutated organisms and natural selection. I prefer the odds to be totally stacked in my favor.

[mizducky]

Natural Selection Foods a.k.a. Earthbound Farms is apparently a huge outfit based here in California, that supplies organic produce under a whole constellation of brand names.

Here is the notice about the spinach recall from Earthbound's website. Note the long list of brandnames--including some interesting and familiar ones.

Here is a recently-posted AP wire article noting the pinpointing of Natural Selection.

Re: inevitable questions about "organic" farming: I recall seeing articles go by in the newsletter for my local organic food co-op, expressing concern about the huge upsizing of "organic" farms such as Earthbound, questioning whether operations on that scale were still capable of taking the level of care necessary to provide healthy product. There was also some feeling that big outfits like Earthbound/Natural Selection, by packaging and shipping product across the country, were sort of going against the whole spirit of local, small farms supplying produce to their communities (though that's not an actual part of the definition of "organic," as such).

Some accounts I've read or heard (on the radio) today speculate that the current practice of some large-scale farms of doing at least some of their processing right there in the fields, while making for greater efficiency, does raise the risk of contamination--for instance, from washing produce in the field with water cross-contaminated by run-off from nearby cattle farms. Note that scenarios like this are pure speculation at this point. But given that the current suspect is pre-washed pre-bagged spinach, rather than, say, fresh spinach (organic or otherwise) sold unwashed in bunches like many markets carry, the arrow does seem to be pointing to something somewhere in the processing chain, rather than in the growing methods.

[johnsmith45678]

I bet it's the frogs in the bags of spinach that are responsible for the E. coli.

[robyn]

Just my 2 cents.

I think it's prudent for consumers to dump the product if it's in their refrigerators and for companies to take the product off their shelves since the outbreak is widespread - no one knows when - where or what happened - the infection is extremely dangerous - and the most common way to cook small spinach leaves is in a quick saute (which probably isn't enough to kill e coli). I don't think they'd stand up to a "southern" cooking process (at least an hour of cooking with some kind of pork).

As for organic versus non-organic - in one of the discussions I heard today - someone mentioned that produce could be tainted if an animal (domestic or wild) defecated in the water or part of the water supply installation that was used to irrigate a crop. I reckon this could happen both with organic and non-organic produce. And if the product is contaminated through its water source - the bugs can be "in" the product - as opposed to "on" it - so no kind of washing will help.

Sometimes I eat organic stuff - sometimes I don't. I'm not "orthodox" about it. After all - those disgusting fish parasites (I thought they were clever in terms of how they work - but disgusting) which are the subject of another thread here today in the Japan forum are 100% natural and organic.

BTW - they sell Earthbound Farms produce in our grocery stores here in Florida. I don't buy the stuff because it's cheaper to buy "regular" spinach (and it tastes just as good to me). Robyn

P.S. One big potential problem with organic produce is the use of manure - especially since composting isn't an exact science. I would rather eat produce that's "manure free" than produce that isn't - just like I'd rather eat produce from fields where the workers have access to porta-potties.

Edited September 16, 2006 by robyn (log)

[Fat Guy]

There shouldn't be any connection between, on the one hand, the presence or absence of organic farming methods and, on the other hand, the presence or absence of E. coli in spinach. Especially if the E. coli comes from the irrigation water, it's likely that many of the farms -- whether or not they're organic -- in a given area (in this case apparently Salinas, CA) are using the same water supply.

I think discarding the spinach is definitely the way to go. Although cooking it may very well destroy whatever E. coli is in the spinach at the time it hits pasteurization temperature, there are also handling concerns. For example, if you take the spinach out of the bag with your hands, you can get E. coli on your hands. Then, whatever else you handle in the kitchen is at risk, or you may transmit it hand to mouth. Likewise, you may use a spoon or other utensil on the spinach before it has reached pasteurization temperature, and then you may use that spoon in something else.