Killer tomatoes?
Posted on June 12th, 2008 – 8:15 AMBy Maura Lerner
Have you been looking at your tomatoes lately, wondering if they can hurt you?
This weeks’s news about salmonella poisoning stirred up a lot of anxiety as grocery stores and restaurants across the country scrambled to pull tomatoes off the shelves.
We wondered what, if anything, we can do to make sure tomatoes are safe to eat. Here’s some insight from a conversation with Dr. Heidi Kassenborg, a food safety expert at the Minnesota Department of Agriculture.
Q/ Can you wash salmonella off a tomato?
Not necessarily. Salmonella can contaminate the inside of the tomato as well as the outside. You might think tomatoes are pretty impervious, but contaminants can get inside during harvesting and production.
“We’re not saying stop washing tomatoes,” she said. But it’s just like eggs, which are also vulnerable to salmonella poisoning. “They’re not as solid as you think they are.”
Q/ Does cooking kill salmonella?
Yes. “But a good rule to live by is, when in doubt, throw it out.”
Q/ How does salmonella get into vegetables or other foods?
It can happen anywhere in the chain of production, from harvesting to the kitchen table. It can be spread through infected water, food handlers, or other sources of contamination.
Q/ Salmonella is often found in poultry, beef, milk and eggs. Are vegetables equally vulnerable?
That’s hard to say. A lot depends on how they’re handled. But you have to balance the risk with all the benefits to your health from fruit and vegetables.
Q/ What else can we do to avoid food poisoning?
There are some things you can control, and some you can’t. One thing you can control is what happens in your kitchen and on the barbecue grill. Cook your meat thoroughly. Don’t put fruit or vegetables next to raw poultry or meat.
Here’s more on salmonella and the latest outbreak, from the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
