Tip of the Iceberg Lettuce with food safety

Pardon my pun about tip of the iceberg...lettuce regarding food safety, but now that I have your attention, I'll give you my take on this latest of food crisises.
Over the week-end I passed by a Farmer's Market and it was packed. Smart people know that it is always best to eat food grown regionally and even that does not guarantee total food safety, but it's a start. Today, we demand year round availability of certain fruits and vegetables because so many people don't know how to can (I don't, so I'm not criticizing).
Thanks to pesticides and modern transporation, America's kitchens can have fresh foods from all over the world. I saw some grapes at the store last week with "EU" on the plastic bag. Other consumables I've noticed everywhere from Mexico to Chile and beyond.
Friends would laugh when I told them years ago that I washed my lettuce with hot soap and water and then cold. They don't laugh anymore.
I personally think that we've had much more food borne illnesses over the years that have been deemed as the "24 hour flu", when in reality it has been food that caused the illness. The reporting is much better today, but I also think that there is a sloppiness about food handling that puts all of us at risk.
I think we would be horrified at the lack of personal hygiene not only in the fields (can't those poor souls have port-a-potties) and in your local restaurants (that's a scary as any field borne illness and even more preventable).
I watched a great story on CNN about a Pasedena California family on one-third of an acre that grow everything they eat, plus supply local restaurants with their abundance as well. I think we will see in the future an explosion of little urban gardens and that, as Martha Stewart says, "is a good thing".
The bottom line is that this is just one more thing piled on to a host of modern days stress and worry that is becoming something akin to the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Maybe, we can be likened to the title of the Alfred Hitchcock movie, "The Man Who Knew Too Much" or my Father's old adage "what you don't know won't hurt you" or somewhere in between. Bon apetit (Julia Child).

reply to post by Barbs46


Not to mention the dangers of ingesting genetically altered foods.
Most people seem to think that one just puts stuff in ones mouth and tataaaa! it magically turns into food that we can use the energy of.
"food is food" is one of the most ignorant remarks I have heard.
Science, ofcourse is the culprit in these; science has reduced food to be a combination of necessary vitamins, sugars and proteins.
Experience has taught us differently. To only eat lets say dietary supplements that contain the 'required daily amount' of everything has led people to disease and even death.

What you eat is what you think and feel...believe it or not





[edit on 16-6-2008 by dervishmadwhirler]