Some raising red flag over use of gas to keep meat in the pink(2002 FDA)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06050/657804.stm

If the meat you buy at your neighborhood grocery store is bright pink, it must be fresh, right? Not necessarily.

Since 2002, the Food and Drug Administration has allowed the meat industry to sell various types of meat treated with carbon monoxide, which preserves the meat's pink color long after it normally would have turned brown without actually spoiling.

Keeping it pink allows grocery stores to sell meat they otherwise might have thrown away, but it's not to everyone's liking. Some lawmakers, meat industry observers and even some local grocers aren't so sure it's a good idea for consumers.

Ed Steinmetz, vice president of meat, seafood and prepared foods for Giant Eagle grocery stores, said consumers who aren't paying careful attention to expiration dates or who, in their thrift, are inclined to use meat past those dates, might well be misled by the carbon monoxide-treated meat's fresh-looking color into buying and even eating spoiled meat.

[benburch]

1. And you know that supermarkets are notorious for changing sell by dates...

on meat.

[sandnsea]

2. Brown meat isn't spoiled

But somehow selling brown meat is going to keep people from eating spoiled meat. :crazy:

What it will do is convince people brown meat is okay to eat, meaning they will eat MORE spoiled meat.

Unless of course, they remember that if it stinks, don't eat it.

[megatherium]

30. Meat doesn't need to smell bad to be dangerous to eat.

All meat now has labels on it warning consumers to cook it before eating it.

[ConcernedCanuk]

3. I watched a report regarding skinless chicken

.
.
.

When the chicken starts to stink, the butchers wash it and THEN take the skin off

Repackage it

Ergo the higher price for skinless chicken

(gotta get that labor and repackaging cost back ya know)

I've never bought skinless chicken since

And meat packed in those styrofoam things is how they get away with stale meat . .

Dincha ever notice that when you take it outta the wrap and flip it over that it's BROWN on the backside?

hmmmmm

[NYC]

4. You must have reported that on DU.

I remember that someone saw the chicken skin story on Canadian television, and reported it on DU. I told all my friends. I've been boycotting chicken for two years or more, but if I ever buy chicken, I will be sure to buy it with the skin.

Thanks for the information.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

12. Buy your chickens whole...

... at your local small town locker/game processing plant. They will have whole, frozen local free range chickens for sale at nearly the same prices as in the grocery stores. And much higher quality, too. I buy my meats from one of two local custom butchering/lockers that only butcher a few head a day, at most. The meat tastes fresher and I know they guy's/lady's face and name who I bought it from. Heck, I even toss down VO and cokes with one of them some late afternoons.

[ConcernedCanuk]

15. Good memory ya got there NYC!

.
.
.

Yes I did post that a while back,

and thot it prudent to mention it again.

You and everyone else are more than welcome

[NYC]

16. It's one of those things that is worth remembering.

Thanks for posting it in the first place. :hi:

[Warpy]

5. All they need to do is put it out under fluorescent lights

because that's part of what gives the surface of meat that nice pink color. All meat looks brown on the inside. Light and oxygen pink it up wherever it's touched. That gas won't do anything but hurry the process by a few minutes when they first put that meat in the display case.

As for selling old meat as fresh, old meat will still have some of that pink color. You know it's bad when you open the package and get knocked flat by the smell.

Slightly "off" meat isn't really that bad if you cook it properly. Just don't think you can get away with eating it rare. Braising and stewing are the methods for iffy meat, meat that has only a slightly "off" smell. Most beef sold in the supermarket is already aged at least a week or two. It has to be really old to go really bad.

Remember, Columbus was commissioned to find a sea route to the Spice Islands. People in Europe mostly lived on spoiled meat, and all those pungent spices were necessary to mask the flavor of really, really spoilt meat.

[Occulus]

7. I suppose this wouldn't apply to butchers who cut off the carcass

At least- I would HOPE it wouldn't apply to them.

Does it? My mom buys all her beef in the same place, and yhas for years and year, and the butcher she gets it from has always been pretty good.

Since it's fresh, should she worry about this?

[politicat]

36. The historian in me must contradict that....

People didn't eat spoiled meat, they used the spices to preserve the meat.

Most spices have an antibacterial effect. They preserve meat in in the time between butchering and hanging and cooking. Further, since most meat was not eaten in the warm summer months, but in the winters, when natural cooling would keep it fresh, spicing served to mask any flavors the meat had picked up from being "freezer burned" due to the temperatures of the cold pits in which it was kept.

Spices also helped mitigate against the overwhelming flavor of salt, also used as a preservative. Summers were the famine season, since the animals were too young to slaughter, the crops not yet matured, the winter stocks were used up and there was little importation of food. Fall and winter were fine; spring (and thus, Lent) were when things were getting lean, but the stocks could be stretched if necessary, but summer was bad.... Summer was for cheese, seasonal fruit and greens primarily - beer and cider would be in short supply, fruit would be ripening in stages, and greens would be available in the fields. Cheese would be in abundance because calving and lambing are in the spring, so most of the little animals would be weaned, but the mothers could continue to be milked for a few months.

For a history of food in the Middle Ages, see: Early French Cookery (by D. Eleanor and Terence Scully) or any translation of Du Fait de Cuisine (a medieval cookbook.)

[formercia]

6. Ever go to a steak house?

Those nice tender steaks are that way because of the natural breakdown processes that happens when meat rots. The meat cutters just cut off the green, oxidized outer layer. Yum!

[Historic NY]

8. aged = rotted beef.........

...people will pay extra for stuff like that.

[truthisfreedom]

9. oh behave.

a nice dry-aged steak is a wonderful thing.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

13. Aged beef is...

... aged in a cooler/freezer at 34.5 - 36 degrees or so for whatever "secret" aging process the individual steakhouse owner has. This causes natural enzymatic breakdowns in the meat and causes it to become "tender". They use papaya products in almost any "meat tenderizer" you buy off the shelf at the stores, which has the same effect, enzymatic changes to the meat it comes in contact with. Any steakhouse worth it's salt ages their own quarters or sides of beef. I happen to be very good friends with one of the top rated non-chain steakhouses in the nation. So I am not giving away anymore of his "secrets". B-)

[formercia]

14. I have a relative in the meat business

and he makes a very good living selling prime, aged beef to country inns and restaurants. If done properly, prime, aged meat is well worth the money. From a health standpoint, cheap, lean cuts are probably better for you.

[warrens]

33. Dry-aging isn't the same as rotting

The steaks are kept in a temperature controlled case with fans blowing over them.

[MrPrax]

10. "aren't so sure it's a good idea for consumers."??

So what would make them sure?

Big piles of money or big piles of food poison victims? Combination of both?

We sure have progressed since the good old days--it used to be folks were locked up for fraud and selling 'fake' goods, now it's debated among lawmakers!!

[teknomanzer]

11. Bleh!

Time to give up eating meat...

[Robb]

17. It sounds like packing in CO2

If you read the article, it sounds like they're packing in sterile CO2 instead of ambient air.

Good enough for an open bottle of wine, but not for a NY strip? :shrug:

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. No, it's carbon *monoxide*

Once in contact with the meat, the carbon monoxide reacts with the natural myoglobin in meat, the substance that usually carries oxygen into the muscle tissues, to produce carboxymyoglobin, a bright red substance that resists turning brown. Normally, oxygen reacts with myoglobin to create oxymyoglobin, which tends to turn brown over time.

And the spoiling is caused by bacteria that tolerate the carbon monoxide quite happily. So it goes off at the same rate as meat packaged in normal air, but we don't get the visual signal of a brown colour - which, by coincidence, happens alongside the spoiling.

[Robb]

37. My mistake

Amazingly, I got that it was about meat, at least. :D

[humbled_opinion]

18. I'm gonna puke..

WOW lots of good info here... I had no idea that the meat was that old... call me gullible but I thought if it was on display for more then 2 or 3 days it got frozen or tossed...

I'm off meat...

[seafan]

20. WP: FDA Is Urged to Ban Carbon-Monoxide-Treated Meat

FDA Is Urged to Ban Carbon-Monoxide-Treated Meat

By Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, February 20, 2006; Page A01

Picture two steaks on a grocer's shelf, each hermetically sealed in clear plastic wrap. One is bright pink, rimmed with a crescent of pearly white fat. The other is brown, its fat the color of a smoker's teeth.

Which do you reach for?


The meat industry knows the answer, which is why it has quietly begun to spike meat packages with carbon monoxide.

The gas, harmless to health at the levels being used, gives meat a bright pink color that lasts weeks. The hope is that it will save the industry much of the $1 billion it says it loses annually from having to discount or discard meat that is reasonably fresh and perfectly safe but no longer pretty.

But the growing use of carbon monoxide as a "pigment fixative" is alarming consumer advocates and others who say it deceives shoppers who depend on color to help them avoid spoiled meat. Those critics are challenging the Food and Drug Administration and the nation's powerful meat industry, saying the agency violated its own rules by allowing the practice without a formal evaluation of its impact on consumer safety.

"This meat stays red and stays red and stays red," said Don Berdahl, vice president and laboratory director at Kalsec Foods in Kalamazoo, Mich., a maker of natural food extracts that has petitioned the FDA to ban the practice.

If nothing else, Berdahl and others say, carbon-monoxide-treated meat should be labeled so consumers will know not to trust their eyes.

The legal offensive has the meat industry seeing red.

snip

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/19/AR2006021901101.html

[ecoalex]

21. Add this to the mad cow cover up.

[blue antidote]

22. There go the meat prices.

"Fresh" meat browns rather quickly but is good for many days beyond that. Consumers will NOT buy browned meat thinking it old, which is too bad because then grocers have to discount it to move it and recover the discount in the pricing of new "redder" meat.

Solution: educate the public that browned meat is not old meat. Will that ever happen? No. Result: higher prices again. I have zero problem with using CO 1 to keep meat red because meat prices are high enough already.

[jayctravis]

26. Aren't there steakhouses that tout "aged beef"? (n/t)

[formercia]

27. Aged Beef is tender due to enzyme breakdown.

Prime cuts tend to have a high fat content as well. Done properly, ageing is harmless and saves your body some work in digesting the meat. It's a matter of personal choice. A couple of glasses of yeast excrement to go with that steak is good too.

[seafan]

23. Another snip:

They note that the European Union has banned the use of carbon monoxide as a color stabilizer in meat and fish. A December 2001 report from the European Commission's Scientific Committee on Food concluded that the gas (whose chemical abbreviation is "CO") did not pose a risk as long as food was kept cold enough during storage and transport to prevent microbial growth. But should the meat become inadvertently warmer at some point, it warned, "the presence of CO may mask visual evidence of spoilage."

How is it, Berdahl and others ask, that something can be deemed "generally recognized as safe" when there is enough scientific debate over the issue to warrant a ban in Europe?

"I just picture a refrigerator truck breaking down in Arizona and sitting there for an afternoon. Then, 'Hey, we got it repaired and nobody knows the difference,' and there you go."

Opponents also say the FDA was wrong to consider carbon monoxide a color fixative rather than a color additive -- a crucial decision because additives must pass a rigorous FDA review. They note that freshly cut meat looks purplish red, and that the addition of carbon monoxide -- which binds to a muscle protein called myoglobin -- turns it irreversibly pink.

DATES on meat packages are NOT wholly reliable, as there have been ongoing reports of dates being changed on repackaged meat in grocery stores over the years.

So, now, COLOR is no longer reliable as an indicator of freshness.

ODOR is the only tool the consumer is left with now. Wonder how long it will be before artificial scents are added to cover that?


It is getting past time for a boycott against the industries who willingly deceive the public for purely a profit motive.

[Burried News]

24. Could carbon monoxide pink up the politicians in Washington?

I'm willing to give that a try, but I note CO doesn't retard the slime formation or decay.

As for the meat in the grocery store, I believe they have been playing with the color of it for some time now.
Very good but troubling article.

[sendero]

25. I'm pretty sure..

.. that meat has been treated with one thing or another (to keep it red) for decades. What's so special now?

[GoddessOfGuinness]

29. The stuff that's been treated with dye turns brown...

when the dye seeps to the bottom of the package or when improperly refrigerated.

This makes it easier for stores to cheat consumers. Think they won't?
Think again.

[MadHound]

28. Just one more reason to get meat from your local farmer

They don't have the facilities to "pink up" their meat, most raise their meat organically, and they are all quite happy to educate you on the finer points of the meat that the deal in. And generally, if you can buy meat in bulk and have the freezer space to store it, it is much, much cheaper. I picked up a quarter beef from my neighbor last fall at a total of 2.36 a pound, including hamburger, roasts, steaks of various cuts, etc. etc.

[LeftyMom]

31. I was just going to post this, I saw it at another site

I am once again reminded why I'm soooooooooooooooooo glad I'm vegan.

[arikara]

32. Well the only good thing about this is that its...

one more reason to stop eating animals. And I really do want to stop eating meat but I'm having the same trouble giving it up as I did quitting smoking. What tipped me over the edge with smoking was when they banned it from restaurants. I used to love people-watching with a good cup of coffee and a couple of smokes.

[LeftyMom]

35. psst

You know about the veg group, right? We'd be happy to help you out. :)

Have a cookie (they're vegan) and come check it out if you haven't.

[warrens]

34. The solution is a temperature indicator

To show if the meat has ever been allowed to go above 40 degrees, and a VERY LARGE Use-By date. The real danger here is leaving the meat in the fridge too long, but it is a very real danger. The carbon dioxide in the packaging atmosphere actually kills pathogens, so this packaging has more than a few advantages.

The real issue here, as Tom Harkin and others have pointed out, is they didn't even hold any hearings about this, even though the EU banned it several years ago because there was no guarantee that the cold chain had been preserved. There are now strips that can be attached to each package that turn color if the temperature rises too far. They still cost a lot, but they would act as a tamper-evident safety check. Eventually, the food industry is going to have to adopt them or something similar in return for the huge gain in shelf life they're getting.

[PBass]

38. My local grocery store must use it.

The hamburger meat looks fresh and pink on the outside, but when you pull the mound apart, it's brownish in the middle.

As a result, I figured the meat was dyed, and so I stopped buying meat there. So the butcher didn't help himself in the long run, even though the meat looked fresh.