NYT: U.S.D.A approves for 8 years injecting beef w/ ammonia to kill E. coli

[keep_it_real]

With the U.S.D.A.’s stamp of approval, the company’s processed beef has become a mainstay in America’s hamburgers. McDonald’s, Burger King and other fast-food giants use it as a component in ground beef, as do grocery chains. The federal school lunch program used an estimated 5.5 million pounds of the processed beef last year alone.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/us/31meat.html?_r=1

[CurtEastPoint]

1. And quick check of the inventor of this 'food process'

shows he is a frequent donor to the GOP.

Shocked, I tell you!

Eldon Roth, owner of 'Beef Products'

Gag me.

This is from their site: BPI's products are found in the majority of all ground beef produced in the United States. Current production of over 7 million pounds per week, makes BPI the world's largest manufacturer of boneless lean beef in the world. Eating a hamburger from a Quick Service Restaurant or buying ground beef from your local retailer, the chances are you'll be eating product produced by BPI.

[flvegan]

2. Mmmm...more feces in ground beef.

Shitburger, anyone?

[Siwsan]

3. Isn't that what cooking is supposed to do??

I'm not a big fan of beef, but I thought that cooking it to an appropriate degree would kill the ecoli.

[Shallah Kali]

14. wouldn't the toxins already produced still be in the food

even if everyone in America actually thoroughly cooked their ground beef and never ever under cook? people I know like their burgers under cooked or as one relative says still mooing :puke:

[bluedave]

4. why not

Hell I see Andrew Zimern eating rotten shark and fish and whatever else and he ain't dead YET.

[LouKneeLib]

5. Ok.....

I hope this is food grade ammonia.

[DeschutesRiver]

6. Oh. my.

That is simply disgusting. Not only the injection of ammonia, but that the USDA allowed this company to test its flawed theory on the American public, and that Beef Products continues to do this even though its products remain tainted from e-coli and salmonella despite their ammonia bath.

Right now, I only eat the beef we raise ourselves. Told dh last night that if we are ever unable to raise our own, which becomes more likely the older we get, I am going back to the vegetarian diet I had in my twenties, and using what we grow up here (or local in so far as I can find local organic vegetable/fruit growers that I can trust, which aren't as easy to find as I used to think they would be).

I remember when I used to cook store bought ground beef, and it had this odd, almost chemical odor. Found myself saucing it up more and more to disguise the taste, and then eventually only eating very small portions. Didn't know what was happening to beef, but it just wasn't normal. And then the first time I cooked our free grazed, grass only beef, and realized that it smelled radically different. Smelled and tasted more like the beef I ate as small kid when we lived in a rural area, before feedlots with their grain & daily antibiotic fed animals were so widespread.

I no longer eat any beef than our own - I rarely even eat out because I have no idea what is being fed to me any more.

[murielm99]

7. We used to raise our own beef.

My husband is 65, and we don't farm any more.

I could trust the meat then. I could prepare rare or medium rare beef without worrying. I would never do that now.

There is an organic farmer near us who sees to it that the meat is processed safely, too. We can't get anything from him, because he only sells in quantity, and he has a huge waiting list.

Last year at this time, I was in the beginning stages of e.coli. I am lucky to have survived with my kidneys intact.

[DeschutesRiver]

15. I am very glad you survived your bout with e-coli

how frightening that must have been for you:(

I too remember never worrying about how we cooked meat when I was growing up - I have adjusted, but am constantly reminding dh about the need now to be more careful. Too bad you are not closer to me, and I could sell you some of our beef:) Whenever I re-adjust the herd size, we sell halves or wholes, but if there is a way, we've done less too. Right now we are carrying a few more than normal during the winter, because I am not certain yet if I will be replacing my bull, plus some are pregnant and I'd like to see how their offspring turns out so I can make a better culling decision next June.

I do enjoy raising them and working our horses too, but of late, and esp. now that the snow is flying, I realize this might be a younger person's game, at least depending on how we age, health issues, etc. My arthritis and a few other things are making it a bit tough now, and I am only in my early 50s (dh is 56). But we've still alive, and that counts for a lot:)

[Edweird]

8. Man, why can't they discover that Ketel One or Jack Daniels kills e-coli?

Why does it have to be fucking ammonia?

Assholes.

[tabasco]

9. I just love beef strammonia-nof.

[madokie]

18. LOL

would you pronounce that please :rofl:

[Union Yes]

10. Dupe.

[Union Yes]

11. People, if our corporate overlords say ammonia is a healthy nutrient then it must be safe.

:sarcasm: :banghead:

[Union Yes]

12. self delete.

[G_j]

13. disgusting!

anyone hungry?

[HopeHoops]

16. SCREAMING BLUE MEANIES!

I haven't had beef in 20 years and fast food was gross long before then. This is just one more reminder that it really IS gross.

[Hekate]

17. This time 8 years ago my best friend was working for the boss of the Agriculture Dept in DC

She no longer eats beef. Period. Doesn't eat chicken, either.

After Katrina and the drowning of New Orleans, I wrote to her and asked if Bush had done to the Ag Dept what he'd done to FEMA. She said yes, he had. 'Nuff said, imo.

What Idiot Son's policies and cronyism did to food safety was to take it back a century.

Hekate

[madokie]

19. We'll be having bushco hangovers for years and this is just one of them

I'll be surprised if we don't still find where they fucked us on something that we're unaware of years from now. I'm telling you they were evil

[spanone]

20. goodbye burgers....

[WestSeattle2]

21. Incredible. I think I'll cut my beef intake from three times

per year down to zero.