Exclusive: Cookie Dough Loaded With Three Kinds of E. Coli

[RamboLiberal]

Source: ABC News

Federal investigators have linked at least three different kinds of E. coli to Nestle's cookie dough but remain stumped about how the bacteria got into the product, ABC News has learned.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has completed DNA testing of E. coli recently found in an unopened package of cookie dough at Nestle's plant in Danville, Va.

Those tests, according to sources familiar with the investigation and confirmed by the FDA, determined the genetic fingerprint of the E. coli found at the plant is different than E. coli that has been linked to a 30-state outbreak that has sickened at least six dozen people.

Sources also say an altogether different strain of E. coli was found in dough recovered from the home of a victim, meaning at least three different types of E. coli have been found in cookie dough made by Nestle.



Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=8043846&page=1

[Hell Hath No Fury]

1. Commercial sabotage???

[Warpy]

9. That's sure what I'm thinking

Disgruntled worker with samples from his animals. Or himself.

Eeeew.

Chocolate chip cookie dough is one of the easiest things to make. Use powdered eggs and there's practically zero chance of contamination in the raw dough.

Processed dough should always be COOKED instead of eaten raw!

[Robb]

2. Another reason to avoid Nestle. nt

[lindisfarne]

3. Most strains of e. coli aren't pathogenic. Article doesn't specify what strains were found.

One of the strains was capable of causing food poisoning - but nothing is specified about the other 2.
"Nestle issued a press release June 29 confirming that the FDA had informed the company "that it has found and confirmed evidence of E. coli 0157:H7 in a retained production sample of 16.5 oz. Nestle Toll House refrigerated chocolate chip cookie dough bar.""

... is a Gram negative bacterium that is commonly found in the lower intestine of warm-blooded organisms (endotherms). Most E. coli strains are harmless, but some, such as serotype O157:H7, can cause serious food poisoning in humans, and are occasionally responsible for costly product recalls.
...
E. coli normally colonizes an infant's gastrointestinal tract within 40 hours of birth, arriving with food or water or with the individuals handling the child. In the bowel, it adheres to the mucus of the large intestine. It is the primary facultative organism of the human gastrointestinal tract.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escherichia_coli

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

4. Perhaps the answer is to make your cookies from scratch

Since I can't have flour or sugar, I have to make what few cookies I eat by scratch anyway. (And yes, I make delicious cookies using almond flour and stevia.)

[kentauros]

29. And even when there are no restrictions on ingredients you can ingest,

cooking really isn't very hard. Making cookie dough and cookies from scratch is pretty damn easy! :)

However, I would still advise against ever eating raw cookie dough because of the risk of salmonella contamination. Of course, that's not a problem if you replace the eggs with boiled flax seeds, which can be done ahead, refrigerated and spooned out as needed.

[LeftyMom]

32. I use Enger-G egg replacer.

A $5 box lasts me for a year or so and I bake a lot. And it's shelf stable. SO much easier than dealing with expensive, fragile, easily spoiled, almost always contaminated eggs. And I can eat the raw dough whenever I want.

Yay veganism.

[kentauros]

39. I've used Ener-G egg replacer and didn't have good results,

baking-wise. I discovered that boiled flax seeds creates a mucilage that is pretty much an equivalent to the protein strands in egg whites. The seeds will still be there, if you don't mind that added grain. It works great for cookies; I haven't yet tried it for cakes. The ratio is 1-Tbs seeds to 3-Tbs water per egg replaced. You can keep the seeds in the freezer so they don't spoil :)

[demoborn47]

5. Damn

I LOVE cookie dough

[kestrel91316]

27. Then make your own from scratch, and buy non-factory eggs if possible.

Food handled by too many other people is just nonsensical and too hazardous.

It won't kill people to make their own cookie dough. Seriously.

[HopeHoops]

6. Nestle is evil.

I've had a standing boycott against Nestle and all subsidiaries including Contadina, Libby's and Carnation, since about 1986. They push formula in third world countries with salespeople dressed like doctors and nurses and women dry up while they use the "free formula". Then they can't afford the additional formula so they stretch it out - malnutrition. On top of that, most of the areas they do this in don't have safe water supplies. Breast milk is THE BEST THING FOR INFANTS - PERIOD! Nestle is a department of Hell, Inc.

[iris27]

51. Especially in areas where the water supply is questionable.

Evil indeed.

[northernlights]

7. making toll house cookies from scratch

and eating the raw dough until sick was kind of a tradition when I grew up.

I can't imagine making toll house cookies without eating the raw dough. :cry:

[Warpy]

12. The stuff in the refrigerator case is pure crap

and only palatable if you're desperate and cook it according to package directions.

It has a chemical undertaste, especially when eaten raw.

[Captain Hilts]

8. Here's a bet it will be found in other brands. nt

[benld74]

10. Hey I can hear the new commercial jingle now,,,

N_E_S_T_L_E_S

Nestles give you great distress


EEEEEEEEEEECCCCCCCCCCCCCCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLLLLLIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!

[Tansy_Gold]

37. For those who don't remember

[Kingofalldems]

11. Looks like failed repub deregulation is e-coli -ing us to death

Thanks again!

[nc4bo]

13. N.e.s.t.l.e.'s.: What comes out of your a.s.s.

Chooocolaaaate.

We used to sing that little ditty in grade school to the Nestle jingle. It went along with Miss Mary Mack and Miss Susie had a Baby :rofl:

Now nearly 4 decades later, it turns out to be true! Who knew?

Our food industry is disgusting.

[Faygo Kid]

14. I prefer three kinds of chips and nuts - dark and milk chocolate, and Macadamia nuts.

But, if E. coli is all I can get, just so long as I can wash it down with a glass of milk . . . what the hell.

[Paladin]

15. If You're Eating Any Sort Of Raw Cookie Dough, You're An Idiot. (n/t)

[enlightenment]

18. Unnecessary.

This isn't a school yard. You can have an opinion without being offensive, you know.

[Paladin]

41. Don't Worry: Salmonellosis Isn't Transmitted By Self-Righteousness (n/t)

[kimmylavin]

21. No, you're not.

People have been eating raw cookie dough for years.
There's ice cream that features it.

If you're eating raw cookie dough, you just like raw cookie dough.

Thanks for the judgment, though!

[Paladin]

42. Google Is Your Friend.

Punch in "dangers from raw cookie dough" and check out the results. That Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough Ice Cream? No eggs in it.

The fact is, unless you're finding pasteurized eggs to use (as restaurants do), eating substances with raw eggs in them is a risky business. That's not my judgment, that's not Nanny State whining; that's plain fact.

Bon appetit.....

[kimmylavin]

43. Wow.

And you called someone else self-righteous?

You could go to google and punch in "dangers from" just about anything, and you'll find someone who's been hurt. Does not necessarily mean idiocy.

[Paladin]

44. Happy Eating.

The chances of your contacting food poisoning from ingesting raw eggs isn't nearly as probable as suffering a fatality from a game of Russian Roulette, but the basic principle is the same. I hope other DUers read those Google items closer than you evidently did. Feel free to eat all the raw cookie dough you please, as far as I'm concerned. Oh, and by the way: engaging in frivolous behavior that puts your life at risk is idiotic....

[kimmylavin]

45. You're absolutely right.

I'll just stay at home in my bubble.

[LeftyMom]

33. I do whenever I make cookies.

But I'm vegan, so there's nothing to worry about. No eggs.

[Bette Noir]

16. I'm glad I cook from scratch.

[HughMoran]

17. Dough!

:P

[TroubleMan]

19. lol

I'm surprised it took so long for someone to do that.

[incapsulated]

20. Oh, E. coli, is there no food you cannot contaminate?

Damn

[tigereye]

22. we always make ours from scratch - it's not that hard

not a big fan of pre-made cookie dough, myself. But then again, no product sold should have e-coli.

[wildflowergardener]

23. Dough

What I don't understand, is I've always heard you should not eat raw cookie dough because of the change of getting E coli from the raw eggs in it - that the dough in ice cream has something special done to it so it's safe to eat. So I wonder how common it is to have it in raw eggs?

Also I have some of the cookie dough frozen in my refrigerator - I didn't eat it at the time because it was peanut butter cookie dough, and I was afraid to because of all the peanut butter and peanut recalls at the time, though nothing was ever issued about the dough then - interesting that now it's recalled for an entirely different reason.

Meg

[du_grad]

24. There is a lot of confusion here about E. coli

The presence of E. coli, regardless of the strain, indicates fecal contamination, period. It should NOT be in raw eggs, and perhaps did not come in with the eggs this time, but from some other source. Eggs are not ALWAYS the culprit in food poisoning. Not all E. coli is the kind that causes the problems of EC O157:H7 (the kind implicated in the hamburger recalls). There are other strains that produce shiga toxins. Our laboratory now tests all human fecal specimens for shiga toxins, as is recommended by the CDC. I am a medical microbiology technologist with 30+ years of experience.

http://www.cdc.gov/ncphi/disss/nndss/casedef/shiga_current.htm - more information if you like the technical stuff. HUS is Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome, which can kill you.

Salmonella in eggs can come from inside the hen itself, and does not necessarily indicate fecal contamination. Salmonella can be normal flora in chickens and poultry. The organism is inside the chicken and contaminates the INSIDE of the egg while forming inside the chicken. Hence all the washing of the outside shell does nothing to prevent Salmonella infection. This is why you are playing Russian roulette when you order your eggs over easy. It takes a sustained temperature of 140 degrees Fahrenheit or higher to kill enteric pathogens (EC, Salmonella, and others).

The fact that any EC (not necessary a shiga toxin EC - not all EC's are shiga toxin producers by any means) has been found in cookie dough indicates either a problem in their plumbing at the plant, a problem in the supply lines TO the plant being contaminated with fecal material, or something like this. It will take LOTS of investigation to find out why this happened. Municipal water systems call water contaminated when any EC is found in it, as EC is the "indicator" of feces. There are other bacteria in the group Enterobacteriaceae (of which EC is one) but it's the only one not found in nature and only found in feces.

Hope this helps.

[Frank Cannon]

35. Thank you for that.

One question, though. You say "it's the only one not found in nature and only found in feces". What does that mean?

[du_grad]

47. Sorry to be unclear

Microbiology tends to be complicated. I'll try to be brief, but there is some technical stuff necessary to clarify. Here is a good overview of the Enterobacteriaceae:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterobacteriaceae

E. coli is just one organism in the family Enterobacteriaceae. Some of the other Enterobacteriaceae (Enterobacter aerogenes, Enterobacter cloacae, Klebsiella pneumoniae, among others) can occur in human feces. However, the latter three can also be found in the environment. E. coli, on the other hand, is not an environmental organism. Its presence confirms fecal material. If you find the other organisms, it doesn't necessarily confirm fecal material.

There are many many strains of E. coli. Some strains, like EC O157:H7, are toxinogenic, which means they produce a toxin that can then cause food poisoning and other sequelae like HUS (hemolytic uremic syndrome, which can shut down your kidneys and kill you). We used to test for this one strain up until a couple of years ago. They have discovered other strains of toxinogenic EC which produce shiga toxins (see my previous post) so now we have a test for all shiga toxin strains.

Bottom line: for EC to be in food, there has to be a fecal source somewhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escherichia_coli - good writeup here on Wikipedia.

[kestrel91316]

28. Wrong. It's the risk of SALMONELLA from the eggs that's why eating

raw cookie dough is a no-no. It never stopped me, though.

Salmonella in eggs is actually declining now, and some new FDA rules should make it even less of a problem, but it will never be ZERO risk.

E. coli in cookie dough just smacks of a filthy employee pooping and not handwashing.

[wildflowergardener]

46. Thanks.

I guess I just knew that eating raw dough was bad for you and that you could get food poisoning - not what type, but now that you say this, Salmonella is probably what I'd been told - I just didn't recall correctly what I'd heard.

Meg

[Wednesdays]

25. K&R

:kick:

[kestrel91316]

26. Filthy disgusting employee personal habits is my guess.

[bitchkitty]

30. Yuck.

If I want a junk food fix, I eat Twinkies or Snowballs - I don't think anything could livw inside them!

[pinniped]

31. I think some asshole(s) working with food didn't wash his/her hands.

That is, if this particular strain of E. coli is of the human variety.

I guess washing hands is too much trouble these days.

[PfcHammer]

34. Yummo. I lurv me some booty bacterial contamination wif my cooky

[rucky]

36. Is this a new flavor they're rolling out?

Triple E-Coli Chocolate Chunk

[Deja Q]

38. They even made a promotional poster!

[DCKit]

40. Bet the researchers at Fort Detrick are sweating about now...

flushing samples, wiping down their labs.

BTW, where's Dick Cheney?

[Beetwasher]

48. New! And IMPROVED!!! Now With Three Kinds of Teeth Whitening E Coli Juicy GOODNESS!!!

Mmm! Mmm! Good!

[NickB79]

49. Were they named Pukey, Crappy, and Deathy? nt.

[TankLV]

50. Who needs vitamins anyway...!!!

they're SOOO overrated...AND this is ORGANIC!!!