Posted by Janet Harriett on Aug.26, 2010

ⓒ iStockPhoto - CagriOner

The recall of eggs potentially tainted with salmonella has been expanded to affect more than 500,000,000 eggs. Aside from the health hazards of salmonella poisoning, half a billion eggs is a lot of wasted food. The recalled eggs, out of their shells, could:

• Fill 11.8 Olympic-sized swimming pools
• Cover about nine city blocks 1 foot deep
• Fulfill the caloric needs of the entire state of Florida for a day

With raw leafy greens, fresh produce implicated in foodborne illness outbreaks alongside eggs, dairy and meat, avoiding the foods that may carry pathogens doesn’t allow for a healthy diet. Paying attention to where your food comes from, not just what you’re eating and feeding your family, can greatly reduce the risk of exposure to foodborne pathogens.

The eggs in the recent outbreak came from two farms, if “farm” is still the right word for an operation capable of putting out eggs at that volume. There is a time and a place for large-scale food production, but if you have the option, finding sources of local foods that treat both the animals and the farmhands humanely can greatly reduce your risk of foodborne illness, since many outbreaks, especially of minimally processed foods like eggs or raw leafy greens, trace back to poor barn or field hygiene, or contaminated packaging facilities. Buying straight off the farm, when it’s an option, completely eliminates contamination at the packer’s.

These small-farm foods can be more expensive, since smaller farmers who don’t use CAFO practices have higher overhead per animal. I pay $1.70 per dozen for eggs, raised by an Amish farmer, which is about 50 cents more than the typical price of supermarket eggs in my area. However, I know that the hens laying my eggs are kept in conditions that keep the risk of salmonella minimal.

There are other benefits of local foods, too. While the nutrient content of foods depends on several variables that confound the analysis between local and non-local foods, I have a noticed a visible difference between supermarket eggs and small-farm eggs on the few occasions when the hens can’t keep up with the local demand for eggs and I do turn to the mass-produced supermarket eggs for a few days. The yolk contains most of the vitamins in an egg, and the yolks of my locally-grown eggs are almost orange from the carotenoids, but the supermarket egg yolks are pale, indicating lower vitamin levels. This probably has less to do with the location of the hens relative to my refrigerator, and more to do with the better, more individualized care that the local hens receive and the more varied natural diet they eat.

The farm where I buy my eggs also raises beef cattle, and to the extent that I eat meat, I source it from this farm, which raises the cattle without antibiotics or hormones, and has each steer individually butchered at a locally owned and operated slaughterhouse that processes only a few animals a day using a small crew, again reducing the risk of contamination by not overworking the people handling the carcasses. The end result is burger that contains the meat from a single animal, butchered with care by people who live in my community.

It’s not just eggs and meat, though. This time of year, farmer’s markets are in full swing, with plenty of opportunities to stock up on a freezer and pantry full of fruits and vegetables from small, local growers.

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Posted under Health & Fitness, Health Alerts.