Raw Cookie Dough -- Ruined Forever

Raw Cookie Dough -- Ruined Forever pexels.com This is great news for the health-conscious, carrot lovers. But for everyone else, this is a giant letdown. I mean think about it, how much of your childhood consisted of stealing raw batter from mixing bowls? Or popping out a Nestle Tollhouse cookie dough square and eating it until you felt sick from sugar overload? There’s even the eggless cookie dough to prevent health concerns surrounding raw eggs. But no that’s not even good enough anymore. So now what’s the problem? Flour. According to the FDA, a recent outbreak of E.coli is linked to contaminated flour. While it’s easy to brush this off as another panic over some disease you’re never going to get, it’s important to note that this is a fairly widespread problem. In total, 38 people in 20 states have been infected by Shiga toxin-producing E.coli 0121, a strain that can be found in flour. These infections began in December 2015 and have led to the hospitalization of 10 people. So yes, the odds of getting this illness are fairly low, but it’s definitely not worth the risk. The reported symptoms of this outbreak include stomach cramps, diarrhea which is described as bloody, as well as vomiting, much like the stomach flu. However, while most of those infected get better after a week, some aren’t so lucky. Of those infected, some experienced kidney failure, known as hemolytic uremic syndrome. Children under five years old, older adults and those with weakened immune systems are the most susceptible to this severity of the illness. The FDA and the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) ran investigations that led to the source of the outbreak at the General Mills facility in Kansas City, MO. The flour in question was produced in November 2015, and General Mills has since voluntarily recalled 10 million pounds of flour that were produced between November 14 and December 4 of last year. The three brand names effected by these recalls are Gold Medal, Signature Kitchens and Gold Medal Wondra. For those that have any of this flour that’s been recalled, throw it away. The major concern with this particular outbreak is that flour isn’t typically something you consider may be contaminated. According to Jenny Scott, the senior adviser in the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, “flour is not the type of thing that we commonly associate with pathogens.” The assumption is that the flour has been contaminated in the field, as it’s most exposed in this stage. According to Adam Karcz, “E.coli is a gut bug that can spread from a cow doing its business in the field, or it could live in the soil for a period of time; and if you think about it, flour comes from the ground, so it could be a risk.” While this isn’t risky when the flour is cooked (how it’s typically consumed), this is a major issue when it comes to batter and cookie dough. According to Scott, “For the most part, the risk from flour is pretty low, and most use of flour involves a ‘kill step’ people bake with it.” However, it’s still important that when dealing with raw flour, we’re now being extra careful. Constantly wash your hands, don’t touch your face, etc. pixabay.com According to Scott, “Kids are going to handle it and touch their faces, and they’re going to lick their fingers; it’s hard to supervise that.” Karcz suggests storing flour in dry, cool places in order to avoid contamination. Also, it’s important to clean up all kitchen surfaces that came into contact with flour as well as to thoroughly wash any dishes or utensils that were used with flour. This will be your best bet in preventing the spread of bacteria. Also, if any symptoms do develop, report the illness immediately. It’s important for this to be documented to the FDA/CDC, so they can track the outbreak and send out appropriate warnings to others in the area. According to Scott, “We want to encourage consumers to report their illnesses, even though it’s an imperfect system. We’d like to have the tests done and get everything reported and identify these outbreaks so we can follow up, discover root causes and make changes in the system so that people don’t get sick in the future.”