A couple days ago, I talked about some of the marketing jargon used on packaging to make us feel better about buying snack foods. Well, here’s another example of why, as consumers and parents, we have to read and decipher the…
Author Archive for cat
The CTF cake scale
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Eating no cake might be the healthiest choice, but it doesn’t make everyone happy. If you’re going to eat cake (I sure am!), eat the healthiest cake you can.
What the heck is calcium chloride and why is it in my food?
by cat • • 4 Comments
That’s the question I wanted to ask the Trader Joe’s customer service person today. But, being a polite, well-mannered sort of person, I instead asked “Do you know what calcium chloride is?” The friendly guy, who’s name tag indicated he’s…
Label jargonese
by cat • • 1 Comment
Maybe you can’t judge a book by it’s cover, but you sure can judge a snack food by it’s marketing jargon. Figuring out what the package really means is sort of like learning a new language. But jargonese isn’t as…
BPA bans around the nation
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BPA is not federally regulated and safety concerns continue to be researched. Parents, however, don’t want to wait around while science figures out whether BPA in plastic bottles, cups, containers, and other products is harming their kids, which makes banning…
Huntington Meat Packing recalls more meat
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Huntington Meat Packing has recalled more meat — 4.9 million pounds of it. This follows a recall of 800,000 pounds of meat last month. The meat was recalled because the company failed to follow the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control…
One burger, hold the e.coli
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In a recent beef recall, mechanical tenderizing drove the e.coli deep into the meat, where cooking might not kill it. That kind of kills the whole idea of the consumer being responsible for cooking out pathogens. Personally, I expect my…
Triple washed? Um… maybe quadruple will do it.
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The Consumers Union tested 208 bagged lettuce samples from 16 brands and found 39% of them exceeded acceptable levels of coliform bacteria — that’s fecal matter to you and me. CU senior scientist Dr Michael Hansen pointed out: “Although these ‘indicator’…
Contaminated Eggo waffles
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Remember that Eggo waffle recall last year? (I didn’t either — why didn’t that get more press?) Well, I guess I won’t be letting my kids eat Eggo waffles anytime soon. Okay, so we don’t eat Eggo waffles, but even…
USDA’s final rule on organic beef and milk
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The USDA released it’s final rule on pasture feeding and access for organically raised cows. The highlights: Animals must graze pasture during the grazing season, which must be at least 120 days per year; Animals must obtain a minimum of…
New safety rules for school lunches due by July
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The USDA is preparing to enact new food safety rules for school lunches. First up: beef. While not all details are available, one change requires all beef used for schools to be sampled off production lines every fifteen minutes. That’s…
A prelude to eggs in five steps
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I was planning a blog post about how complicated it is to buy eggs these days due to the variety of words used in labeling. Joseph Satto of the Huffington Post beat me to the punch and goes on to…
New nutrition labels
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Consumer advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest has proposed a redesign to nutrition labels on packaging. Changes include larger type for calories and serving size, easier to read ingredients list, and display the amount of whole grains.…
Is your yogurt really yogurt?
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U.S. law allows food manufacturers to label a food as something that it only vaguely resembles. For example, what is yogurt? Yogurt is, according to Merriam Webster, is “a fermented slightly acid often flavored semisolid food made of milk and milk…
Gummy Vitamins
by cat • • 1 Comment
Here’s what happens when I drop the ball on reading ingredients and purchasing thoughtfully: I end up giving my kids really expensive candy fortified with vitamins. Here are the ingredients for Disney Gummies Princesses: Corn Syrup, Sugar, Grape Juice Concentrate,…
Katie Couric talks about antibiotics in livestock
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The use of antibiotics in livestock has been linked to the emergence of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria. Katie Couric delves into the issue on the CBS Evening News. She also points out the link between antibiotic usage and cheap meat.…
Ammonia in beef used at fast-food restaurants and schools
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Recently, the New York Times ran a very interesting (in a gross way) article about a company in South Dakota that treats beef scraps with ammonia. The treated beef scraps are then made into a paste and used in beef…
Michelle Obama launches Let’s Move initiative
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The First Lady is tackling childhood obesity with her Let’s Move initiative. The plan includes creating a task force, improving school lunches, and allocating $400 million to eliminate “food deserts.”  Jane Black from the Washington Post provides a nice summary.