Today's Question:How Do You Properly Cook an Alligator?
A public-health officer in Sydney, Australia, had an urgent question: A consumer found a black, shiny, 1.3-centimeter-long beetle with fine, short antennas and hairy legs in a sandwich. The plastic bag the bread came in "had no holes in it, and I could see the imprint of the beetle within the slice of bread. Would it be possible for the beetle to live through the baking process?"
The official in question knew just where to get the answer: an email network called Foodsafe that posts the correspondence of an elite lineup of microbiologists, chefs, restaurateurs, industry consultants and regulators from about 30 countries, including the U.S., Japan, Mexico, New Zealand and even Iraq. With its debates, battles and mini-celebrities, Foodsafe (
www.foodsafetyweb.info) puts on display world experts as they grapple with the increasingly complex and strange world of food and disease.
A couple of years ago, a Washington state restaurant inspector wanted to know how to cook alligator. Long enough so a meat thermometer registers 165 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 seconds, "same as for fowl to which alligator is most closely related," replied a regulator from Florida. What about eating leftover pizza? Beware mozzarella cheese, which can be a hotbed for potentially dangerous bacteria, said O. Peter Snyder Jr., a St. Paul, Minn., food-safety consultant. And, of course, there's the avian flu. If it leaps from fowl to humans, duck hunters are likely to be the first U.S. victims, Dr. Snyder wrote.
In debates that last for days, months and, occasionally, years, there's talk about bugs, toilets, spoilage and pathogens. Sometimes discussions turn ugly, with clashes among scientists, regulators and corporate health managers.
A Florida bill that would allow dogs on the patios of outdoor eateries stirred intense debate. A New Jersey food consultant, George DeMirjian, who opposes the idea, suggested sarcastically that people should put restaurants in pet stores. Marcel Hofman, an adviser to Belgium's federal food agency, countered that humans actually carry more pathogens and parasites than dogs.
A food-service dietitian asked if document shredders should be used in restaurants to tear up tortillas, egg rolls and wonton skins for use in dishes. On Foodsafe, the practice was likened to cleaning potatoes in dishwashers -- wrong use for the equipment -- and sparked an argument about regulation.
"Let this be a good example of one of the truly odd things local health departments come across," wrote Mark S. Ohlmann, a Louisville, Ky., consultant, who used the shredding debate to argue that food retailers should be regulated by the government. "My point? Self-regulation=No regulation."
Christopher L. Argento, a dietitian at Nassau Community College in New York, said the industry already looks after itself because official inspections are worthless. "Once a year check-ups (= no regulation!)," he responded. "Studies clearly show inspections don't change a thing."
For small restaurants and companies without food-safety experts, Foodsafe "is incredibly valuable," says Mark Newman, director of food and beverage revenue management for a Denver restaurant chain called Rock Bottom Restaurants. A year ago, he had an idea for a new menu item: homemade croutons, made from bread crumbs tossed with melted garlic butter and baked until golden. But how long, he wondered, could he safely store the crumbs?
About a dozen emails later, a consensus emerged. The croutons' moisture would keep them free of harmful bacteria but only for a couple of days. To keep the butter fresh, the croutons must be refrigerated. Mr. Newman said in an interview he decided to keep them no more than two days.
Even big restaurants sometimes need a second opinion. Gayle Femminella, manager for food safety and training at the posh Breakers hotel in Palm Beach, Fla., wondered: "How long can we safely hold sushi grade tuna before using?" The advice, from Yukifumi Konagaya, a fish expert at Japan's Niigata University of Pharmacy and Applied Sciences: "Freezing (less than 20 degrees Centigrade if possible) is most important for safety. I think we can keep tuna for several weeks (or more?) in a freezer. But quality will suffer due to the formation of relatively large ice crystals at this temperature. Better quality will result at -40 C or lower."
Foodsafe in the technical jargon is known as a listserv. Members send emails that are distributed to everyone on the list and then automatically appear on Foodsafe's Web site. It used to be run by the Foodborne Illness Education Information Center, a joint project of the Food and Drug Administration and the Agriculture Department. When the government closed the center last July to save money, it dropped the 10-year-old listserv and laid off its coordinator, Cindy Roberts.
Ms. Roberts, 44 years old, has managed to keep it running with money from other government agencies such as the New Zealand Food Safety Authority and the U.S.'s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The food industry has also chipped in, including Seattle law firm Marler Clark LLP, which represents plaintiffs in food-safety cases. But the operation isn't breaking even, Ms. Roberts says, and she isn't sure how long she can keep it going.
Meanwhile, the listserv is creating its own celebrities. Roy E. Costa, 55, quit his job as a Florida state food-safety regulator after 21 years to open a consulting business after rising to prominence on Foodsafe. "I become a noteworthy person in the field and my opinion gets listened to, which was not always the case in the state," he says.
Ms. Roberts has met Foodsafe fans while traveling in Hong Kong and Costa Rica. Foodsafers, as they call themselves, often wear green ribbons when they attend food-safety summits. "Sometimes I get people who just want to see what I look like," Ms. Roberts says.
Then there's Dr. Snyder, the St. Paul consultant who, among other things, believes that all children under 6 should eat a teaspoon of dirt every day to fend off lurking germs in "the real world." Dr. Snyder dictates daily comments into a tape recorder, usually around midnight, which his secretary sends to the listserv the next day.
"I look at it as a way to have a dialogue with these hard-nosed regulatory [people] who come out [from] behind the iron door, inspect the restaurant, go back to the iron door, and they don't listen," he says. "I go too far sometimes. I say, 'You are stupid.' I try not to."
And what about the bread beetle? Within hours, answers poured forth. "In no way a beetle survives a baking process," said Marcel den Hertog, a Dutch food-safety expert.
"Beetles seldom work alone," added Phillip Shadoin, owner of a Crete, Neb., food-service company called TFG Inc. "If you can't find any brethren, you're looking at a good possibility of a hoax."
Write to Jane Zhang at
Jane.Zhang@wsj.comCorrections & Amplifications:
A Japanese Fish expert suggested that sushi grade tuna be stored at less than minus 20 degrees Centigrade when asked how long the fish could be safely kept before using. This article failed to include the minus.
怎样烹制美洲鳄鱼
澳大利亚悉尼的一位公共卫生官员碰到了一个棘手的问题：一位顾客在三明治中发现了一只甲虫。它身长1.3厘米，全身油亮发黑，细短的触角，腿上毛茸茸的。这位官员说，装三明治的塑料袋“根本就没有孔。我还能看到面包片上甲虫被挤压后留下的痕迹。它有没有可能经过烘烤大难不死？”
这个满脑子疑云的官员知道去哪儿找到答案：Foodsafe电子邮件网络(
www.foodsafetyweb.info)。来自美国、日本、墨西哥、新西兰，甚至伊拉克等30多个国家的微生物学家、厨师、餐馆老板、行业顾问以及监管者等一众精英群体都在此发布信函。这里的讨论、纷争和小负盛名的人物向大家展示了全球专家在千奇百怪层出不穷的食品和疾病世界不断斗争的过程。
几年前，华盛顿州某餐馆检查员想了解如何烹制美洲鳄鱼。佛罗里达的一位监管人员回复说，加热时间够长，让肉的温度在华氏165度保持15秒即可，“做法和它的近亲禽类非常相近”。剩的比萨还能再吃吗？明尼阿波利斯圣保罗的食品安全顾问彼得?斯奈德(O. Peter Snyder Jr.)说，要小心比萨上的mozzarella干酪，它有可能成为滋生细菌的温床。哦，当然，还有禽流感。斯奈德博士写道，如果禽流感从禽类传染到人类，捕鸭人可能就是美国第一批禽流感受害者。
这些短则数天，长则数年的争论涵盖的话题五花八门，包括臭虫、马桶、食物变质以及病原体。有时候争论激烈起来难免走调，科学家、监管者以及公司卫生经理之间时有冲突。
佛罗里达州一项允许顾客带著宠物狗在室外餐饮区就餐的法案引发了激烈的争论。新泽西州食品顾问乔治?德米尔希安(George DeMirjian)大声反对，他不无讥讽地说这还不如把餐馆开到宠物店里。担任比利时联邦食品机构顾问的马塞尔?霍夫曼(Marcel Hofman)反驳说，事实上人体携带的病菌和寄生虫要比狗多。
一位食品营养师曾询问餐馆是否可以用碎纸机来粉碎做菜用的玉米饼、蛋卷和馄饨皮。在Foodsafe上，这种做法被比作是用洗碗机洗土豆，是对设备的错误使用。同时还引发了关于规章制度的讨论。
肯塔基州路易斯维尔的咨询师马克?奥尔曼(Mark S. Ohlmann)说，这个问题可以被视作地方卫生部门所碰到的怪异事件的典范。他还用这场围绕碎纸机的争论来支持自己关于食品零售商需要政府监管的论点。“我的观点？自我规范就等于没有规范。”
纽约拿骚社区学院(Nassau Community College)的营养师克里斯多夫?阿尔真托(Christopher L. Argento)则反驳称，食品行业已经在进行自我管理，就是因为官方检查毫无价值。他回应说，每年检查一次就等于没有监管！而且研究表明检查根本没有改变任何事情。
丹佛连锁餐厅Rock Bottom Restaurants的食品与饮料收入管理负责人马克?纽曼(Mark Newman)说，Foodsafe上的信息对于那些没有食品安全专家的小餐馆和小公司来说弥足珍贵。一年前，他想推出一个新品：家常蒜香包。将面包屑和融化的蒜香黄油搅在一起，然后烤至焦黄色。但是他想知道，面包屑能保质储存多久。
十几封邮件回复之后，共识浮出水面。蒜香包的水分可以使它免受有害细菌的侵袭，但是这种防御只能持续几天。为了保持黄油的新鲜口感，蒜香包必须冷藏。最后，纽曼在采访中说，他决定最多储存两天。
有时大公司也需要听取别人的意见。佛罗里达州棕榈滩的豪华旅馆Breakers负责食品安全和培训的经理盖尔?费米内拉(Gayle Femminella)有一个疑问：“怎样保鲜存放金枪鱼？”日本新泻药科大学(Niigata University of Pharmacy and Applied Sciences)的鱼类专家Yukifumi Konagaya给出了建议：“（如可能，低于零下20摄氏度的）冷冻是最重要的保鲜措施。我认为金枪鱼可以在冷冻柜中储存几个星期（或更久？）。但在低温下冰的结晶体较大，会损害鱼的肉质。零下40度或更低的环境会改善这种情况。”
按技术行话来讲，Foodsafe被称为邮件列表服务(listserv)。会员的邮件会被发给列表上的每一个人，然后邮件内容自动显示在Foodsafe的网页上。美国食品药物管理局(Food and Drug Administration)和农业部(Agriculture Department)共同成立的食源性疾病教育信息中心(Foodborne Illness Education Information Center)以前负责运行Foodsafe。但去年七月政府为了节省成本关闭了该中心，停止运行了十年之久的Foodsafe，解雇了负责人辛迪?罗伯茨(Cindy Roberts)。
现年44岁的罗伯茨设法争取到其他政府机构的资金来维持网站的运转，例如新西兰食品安全局(Food Safety Authority)以及美国疾病预防控制中心(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)等。食品行业也对网站进行了捐助，其中包括代表食品安全案件中原告出庭的西雅图律师事务所Marler Clark LLP。但罗伯茨说，网站目前入不敷出。她也不知道还能维持多久。
Foodsafe上还产生了不少这个领域里的名人。现年55岁的罗伊?科斯塔(Roy E. Costa)在Foodsafe上出名后，辞掉干了21年的佛罗里达州食品安全管理员的工作，开了一家咨询公司。他说：“我已成为这个领域里引人注目的人物了，有人听取我的观点。这种情况在州里可不多见。”
罗伯茨去香港和哥斯达黎加旅行的时候见到了很多Foodsafe的忠实拥护者，他们称自己为Foodsafers。在参加食品安全峰会的时候，他们都佩戴绿丝带。罗伯茨说：“有时候我还碰到只想看我长什么模样的人。”
圣保罗的顾问斯奈德博士也处于名人之列。他的观点之一就是：六岁以下的儿童应该每天吃一勺泥土，用来抵御“现实世界”中隐藏的细菌。斯奈德博士每天口授自己的评论，用磁带录下来。这些事情通常在午夜完成，以便他的秘书第二天将这些内容传送到Foodsafe上。
斯奈德博士说：“我把这看作是与那些顽固监管（者）的一种对话方式。他们总是从铁门后面出来，检查餐馆，然后再回到铁门里面，根本不听任何意见。有时候，我做得有点过火。我会说‘你真蠢’，但我努力控制自己不这样做。”
面包甲虫的问题怎么样了？没过几个小时，答案就纷至沓来。荷兰食品安全专家马塞尔?赫托格(Marcel den Hertog)说，甲壳虫绝不可能在烘烤后仍然活著。
内布拉斯加州克里特的食品服务公司TFG Inc的老板菲利普?萨多伊(Phillip Shadoin)补充说：“甲虫很少单独活动。如果你现在找不到它的任何同伴，那么你极有可能会发现一群甲虫。”
