Dates on Foods

Dates on food packaging are often used by consumers to determine if food should be eaten or not. 

Actually, there is no requirement to put sell-by or use-by dates on foods (except baby formula). Those dates are provided for convenience to allow the stores and companies to know when the food will start to lose eating quality. It helps them know when to take foods off the shelves of stores.

These dates are NOT indicators of food safety.

Best by/ Best if used by dates: Tell when a product will be best flavor or quality. These are not a purchase-by date.

Sell by dates: Tell the store how long to display the food.

Use by dates: Last date to use the food while at peak quality. These requirements are different for baby formula.

Freeze by dates: Last date to freeze food to maintain the best quality. 

  

Cuts to try

I've been sharing posts on Facebook with new cuts to try and I wanted to put them all in one place to make them easier to find.

Clean and Safe during COVID-19

Some folks are very worried about taking trips to the grocery store. 

Please know that the USDA does not know of any cases of  COVID-19 being spread through food or food packaging, but the virus may be found on lots of surfaces. So, some extra precautions after you visit the grocery store may help keep your family safe.

WASH YOUR HANDS - Washing your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and warm water is one of the best ways to keep yourself safe from all germs you may encounter. Its especially smart to wash up when you get home every day, before you cook, after you handle raw meat, and before you eat.

Disinfect your phone. Your phone goes everywhere you do. Some experts suggest leaving your phone in the car when you go in public places, but that's hard. Its smart to disinfect your phone at least once a day.

Wipe off some groceries. When you get home, you may choose to wipe off boxes, cans, bags, and unopened, vacuum-packed meats like hotdogs or deli meats. Germs may be transferred from person to person on lots of different surfaces, so this step can help keep the virus out of your home.

Do wipe off fresh meat packages. Soap or disinfectants like bleach or ammonia may be transferred through the packaging and contaminate the meat. You don't want to consume those.

Do not wash your meat. Washing fresh meat in the sink can splash germs all over your kitchen. 

Do not worry about bacteria and viruses on fresh meat. When you cook meat to a safe temperature, any bacteria or viruses will be killed.

The Meat Industry in the midst of COVID-19

This is a scary time. Our entire society is fighting an enemy we can't see and have never fought before. 

Everyone is worried and stressed.

There have been news reports this week about the virus spreading in meat packing plants and those plants shutting down or significantly slowing production.

What does that mean for our food supply?

First, we are not going to run out of food. Yes, a slow down in production may affect the variety of protein available in some parts of our country, but we are not going to run out. We may have to get more creative or open minded about what we cook and serve our families. We may have to try new things or not have our favorite cuts for a little while. 

But, this too shall pass. We will not run out of food.

Packing plants

Workers in packing plants work in very close quarters. They have to stand near each other. Social distancing is not possible. There are lots of shared spaces like break rooms, changing rooms, and work areas. It’s not surprising that the virus spread in the plants because people are so close to each other.

That doesn't mean that COVID-19 is being passed on to consumers. The USDA does not have any reports of people becoming infected with COVID-19 from food or food packaging. This virus mainly spreads from person to person and is a respiratory virus meaning that you become infected when it enters your nose, eyes, or mouth. Viruses do not grow in food and when foods are cooked, viruses are killed. Follow the four steps of food safety to keep your family safe from all illness; wash your hands, be sure to cook your food to safe temperatures, keep cooked foods away from uncooked foods, and be sure to chill your leftovers in a timely manner.

Companies are doing what they can to keep their doors open and keep their people safe. Many are taking temperatures of employees, testing employees for the disease, and when people are infected, they stay home from work.  There is lots of extra cleaning and sanitation. Workers are wearing masks (most already wear gloves and wash their hands frequently). Some companies are providing partitions to keep people apart from each other.

These plants are in the middle of the food chain, so shutting down can have devastating consequences up and down the food supply.

Farmers

This disease has been dreadful for farmers. Some dairy farmers are dumping milk and egg farmers breaking eggs. We’ve heard about potatoes and other produce going to waste because no one can come pick it. Farmers all over this country have millions of animals ready to go to harvest in our food supply. Packing plants not purchasing them is a devastating condition for those farmers. The supply chain for beef animals goes back over two years to when the cow was bred. Pork and poultry are not quite as long, but still several months.

Grocery stores

People are buying more food in grocery stores than we’ve ever seen. Those stores have to have employees there to keep the food on the shelves. Then there are the truck drivers and supply chain workers that are also still hard at work in this mess. Those folks are putting themselves at risk every day because they have to be interact with people. They wear masks and try to social distance, but it must be so stressful.

In the US, we have the safest, least expensive food supply in the world. But that takes millions of people working every day. I love to think about the scope of our industry. That industry that feeds 300 million people.

Please continue to ask me about the meat industry. Hit me up with questions about new cuts that you are trying or new ways of cooking. Let me know about your successes and failures. Send me concerns about food safety. I’m happy to answer any question you may have.

Lab grown meat is not Impossible

Meat alternatives have been in the news a lot lately. A certain Royal burger chain has recently launched a burger that was once considered Impossible, and I can’t open my inbox or walk through a crowd at a conference without hearing something about lab-grown meat. So, it’s about time that I write something about it.

First. Is it Impossible?

We are really talking about two completely different products here.

       1.      Plant based meats – Products made to taste and feel like meat, but made from plants.

       2.      Lab-grown meats – Meat grown in a petri dish from cells and media. Not from plants, but not really from animals either.

One is out in the market, the other is still in the development stages.

Plant based meats

Some plant-based meats I found at a grocery
store in Texas.

The science behind the Impossible burger is actually pretty cool. They looked at meat and asked themselves, “What makes meat so tasty?” They felt like the answer was heme, a source of iron found in muscle and blood. Heme can also be found in soy and some other plants. So they isolated the heme producing DNA out of the soy plants and inserted it into yeast. Now the yeast can grow the heme through fermentation. They combine that with soy and potato proteins, coconut and sunflower oils, salt and some other ingredients. From there, they make burgers or sausage or whatever they want. If you look at the nutrition information (calories, fat, etc…) of the Impossible burger, you’ll see that it’s pretty similar to a beef burger.

There is another plant-based meat product called Beyond Meat that uses peas, mung beans, fava beans, and brown rice as their protein sources. They also use coconut and sunflower oils as well as cocoa butter and canola oil. Coconut oil is more saturated than other oils and likely gives these products a mouthfeel that is more similar to meats. Beyond Meat prides itself on not using GMOs and instead using beet juice extract, apple extract, and other ‘natural flavors’ to produce the meaty flavor. From what I can tell, the nutrition information on this one is also similar to a beef patty.

Lab grown meats

Meat products made from cells grown in a lab are being developed by over 40 different start-up companies. The most popular and well-funded of those is probably Memphis Meats, out of Berkley, CA. Others include Blue Nalu, Future Meat Technology, Finless Foods, Wild Type, and Aleph Farms.

I’m sure all these companies have their own spin on the process, but in a very basic way, they are using cells isolated from animals, either satellite cells or embryonic stem cells to grow more cells in a lab rather than growing them in an animal.

The cells are grown in what’s called a Bio reactor. Rather than feed and water, the cells need media, which is a combination of salts, sugars, and amino acids. Just like feeds change as animals grow, the needs of the cells change as they grow and differentiate. The scientists control the growth of the cells with hormones and provide them with scaffolding, which is a structure for them to grow on.

This technology is quite expensive. The first cell-based hamburger that was prepared in 2013 cost approximately $278,000, but today that cost is down to about $100. A company called Eat Just, Inc. has chicken nuggets that only costs $50 a piece.

A few of these companies are moving from lab-scale up to pilot plants, but the most ambitious timeline has products available for consumers no earlier than 2022. Most are after 2025.

Certain cell-based products will be easier to develop than others. Comminuted products like ground beef, hot dogs and chicken nuggets will be quicker to develop than those that are trying to produce whole-muscle cuts like a steak, a chicken breast, or a pork chop. The correct texture of a marbled steak will take a little longer to develop than a ground beef burger.

Another hurdle for these products will be regulations. In the US, meat products are regulated by USDA and call-based and plant products are regulated by FDA. The two agencies have agreed to work together to develop food safety regulations and labeling standards for cell-based meats.

One big question is what will it be called? The USDA has standards of identity for labels like ground beef, ham, and chicken nuggets. Currently, it is not clear if beef grown in a lab outside of a cow meets those standards. (I don’t think so, but no one has asked me.) Regardless, cell-based meat or lab-grown meat doesn’t have a very good ring to it.

So, lab-grown meats are still a long way from our dinner plates. As a rancher, a meat scientist, and as a mom, I’m not really worried about feeding them to my family any time soon.