Dumb and Dumber

Posted By elissa on Jan 15, 2009 | 1 comment

2009 is still young, but I already have one candidate for “Stupidest Food Article of the Year” on my screen: “Cheese – It’s Grosser than You Thought” over on msnbc.com.

Cheese makes some foodies jump up and down like little kids, but behind that heavenly taste and texture lies bacteria, mammal stomach lining and pure fat.

To ripen cheese and add flavor, bacterial strains are freely injected and smeared into the substance…

…Flourishing microbes are consumed with every bite of cheese (though the cooling temperatures in refrigerators do slow down bacterial growth, they do not kill them in cheese or in any other food). Bacteria (either naturally swimming around the milk or manually injected) and enzymes derived from the inner stomach linings of any slaughtered milk-producing mammal (called rennet) are added to coagulate the milk into curds.

“Freely injected and smeared”??? Almost sounds like cheese makers are practicing biological warfare!

Reality check: bacteria are used in any number of food fermentations, and have been centuries…think yogurt, salami, sauerkraut and butter.  Related microbial fermentations by yeast are responsible for wine, beer, bread and kefir.  Microbial fermentation is one of the oldest food preservation techniques known to man.  The vast majority of bacteria are non-pathogenic, after all.  Our skin is teeming with them.  Our intestines are swarming with them.  They’re everywhere, in massive numbers.

We even swallow them in capsules for health purposes, for heaven’s sakes.

Likewise, enzymes are produced by living creatures.  Whether they’re purified from organs or via biotechnology is irrelevant…I could produce a gross-out scenario for either one.  The point is that there’s nothing particular icky about it…or rather, nothing icky that can’t also be said for virtually every other food in existence.  Whole grains?  There are bug parts in your flour – they simply can’t be avoided in any mass produced grain product.  Natural peanut butter?  Oops, contains traces of aflatoxin – a natural carcinogen produced by a mold.  Wholesome, fresh juice squeezed from apples? Uh-oh, there’s mold there too – patulin is another nasty mycotoxin.  Sushi?  OMG – raw fish is teeming with potential nasties: like 9 foot-long tapeworms.

If the dim bulb who wrote this article thinks cheese is gross, she ought to read up on how chocolate is produced.  Cocoa beans are fermented in a compost-like heap using the “bugs” off the workers’ hands and surrounding vegetation.  Mmmmmm…

That’s the sweet thing about being a “nutrition” writer, I guess…you get to have it both ways.  You can whinge about how food processors are trying to poison us with “chemicals” and “additives” – and for a bonus, you can imply they’re also trying to kill us…with perfectly “natural” foods and processes.  It’s a great “heads I win, tails you lose” game…especially when you can get paid for playing it, in the bargain.