Dinamalar

'Washing chicken before cooking can cause food poisoning'

Stop! Don't wash that chicken.

Washing chicken puts you at a higher risk of getting food poisoning, in addition to spreading bacteria around the kitchen, Australian researchers claim.

"Home cooks are probably following what their parents or grandparents did in the past by washing poultry, not to mention probably patting it dry with a tea towel," Food Safety Information Council Chairman, Dr Michael Eyles, said.

But washing poultry splashes these bacteria around the kitchen cross contaminating sinks, taps, your hands, utensils, chopping boards and foods that aren't going to be cooked like salads or desserts," Eyles said.

Researchers found that that six in ten Aussies are guilty of this "foodie crime", 'News.Com.Au' reported.

The Newspoll survey also found that the washing phenomenon isn't just restricted to chicken. 68 per cent of respondents wash turkey and 74 per cent wash duck before cooking.

Doctors believe this could be one of the reasons why notified cases of illness from Campylobacter and Salmonella - bacterias associated with food poisoning - have almost doubled over the last 20 years in Australia.

"But the zealousness of trying to rid chicken of bacteria isn't entirely unfounded.

According to the survey, 84 per cent of raw chicken carcasses tested positive to Campylobacter, and 22 per cent to Salmonella. This is similar to the findings of other surveys overseas, the report said.

"Cooking poultry right through kills these bacteria, making it safe" Eyles said.

To reduce the risk of getting sick from poultry, doctors advise people not to wash raw poultry before cooking, instead mop up any excess moisture with a paper towel.

People should always wash and dry hands and clean surfaces after contact with raw poultry and be careful not to let raw poultry juices contaminate other foods, especially things like desserts or salads, which won't be cooked again.

One should always use clean plates and utensils and wash and dry thoroughly between using for raw and cooked poultry.

Placing cooked food back on the same plate or cutting board that previously held raw poultry should be avoided, doctors said.

Cooking poultry meat to 75 degree Celsius and using a meat thermometer to check if juices run clear and are no longer pink rather than popping a piece in your mouth is always advised, the paper said.

Doctors said one should make sure frozen poultry is defrosted right through to the centre in the fridge or microwave in a sealed container before cooking.

Shimla civic body launches raid on sweet shops to check adulterated sweets

Many sweet shops raided in Shimla

Shimla: In order to check adulteration in sweets during festive season, Shimla Municipal Corporation authorities on Saturday raided a number of sweet shops located in Chhota Shimla, Kasumpti, Panthaghati, New Shimla and in new bus stand area and dumped about one quintal of sweets.
The SMC authorities have said that they would keep their drive during the entire festival season. During the festive season, adulterated sweets are sold in sweet shops.

When sweet temptations sour...

Dig into Diwali mithai at your own risk. Adulteration monitors have reneged on their promise of safety.

Jharkhand's lone food and drug testing laboratory in Namkum, Ranchi, which was revived only last month after two years, has once again shut its doors for three days in a row and there is little guarantee of it reopening before your festive munch.

So far, 22 random samples of sweets and milk products have been collected from Ranchi, and around a dozen of them from Jamshedpur, Dhanbad and Bokaro. Apart from these, health teams in Deogarh, Sahebganj and a few other districts are also expected to return with more samples soon.

However, the problem is that this state of many woes, incidentally, has just one food analyst. The health department had recently retained J.K. Singh from Bihar on contract basis to run the jinxed Namkum laboratory. But, Singh is on leave these days because of a family tragedy.

As a result, the lab has shut its doors and all the samples collected from across Jharkhand to check harmful chemical adulteration are gathering dust with the health department having no back-up plan or proxy analyst to put the same to test.

According to the National Referral Centre for Lead Poisoning Prevention in India, chemical colours are one of the culprits.

A lead-based, carcinogenic dye called metanil yellow is used to give sweets like laddu and some other food items like biryani their inviting colour instead of the permitted tartrazine, which is more expensive. Metanil yellow is cancer-causing and is known to affect the brain and kidneys.
Similarly, muric acid and lead nitrate in paneer or chhana and formalin in milk are toxic and affect the central nervous system. On a lesser scale, Sudan III ' a contaminant often used in gulabjamun ' can cause skin irritations.
Now, in the wake of poor planning and absence of specialists, quality control remains a distant dream and revellers can rely on sheer luck not to fall prey to such dangerous adulteration.

Ever since the food and drug testing laboratory debuted in Jharkhand three years ago, it has had more problems than benefits. After running by fits and starts for close to a year, the Rs 2-crore lab went dormant owing to manpower and equipment crunch, besides high electricity bills.

Increasing instances of adulteration, finally, prompted the state health mandarins to revive the lab in October under the Food Safety and Standards Act (2006), which was implemented in January this year. But, no concrete measures were taken to rope in more than one analyst.

State food controller T.P. Burnwal admitted that the lab had remained closed for the better half of a week. "Our food analyst lost his younger brother. He is on leave. It is a problem beyond anyone's control. We have collected samples, but they could not be tested," he conceded.

Exigencies never come announced. Why did the health department never think of a back-up plan?

"There is a dearth of qualified food analysts not only in Jharkhand, but across the country. We hired our analyst from Bihar, but there was a tragedy we can't help. In Odisha too, the food lab is lying closed. The Union government conducts examinations for food analysts every year, but the success rate is very poor. Only those who qualify this exam and have at least three years of working experience can be hired," Burnwal reasoned.

If the food controller himself is washing his hands of the mess, citizens perhaps have every right to vent their ire.

"Why should we pay for wrong policies and planning at any level? It is the job of the government to stop adulteration of food, not ours. Mithai is an integral part of all festivals, especially Diwali, but we may be risking our lives and that of our near and dear ones because the government is callous," rued Sudha Choudhary, a Ranchi homemaker.

Will you buy and gift coloured sweets this Diwali?