Holy cats! As I read the two articles (see below), my hair stood on end for a moment or two. And, if you use spices in your kitchen (as I hope you do!), your hair is probably going to do the same…But keep in mind that the second article provides an easy peasy solution to this problem: don’t use raw spices but HEAT ’em up. Heat kills all the potentially nasty beasties…
Well, even though I buy only organic spices from sources that I consider to be trustworthy, and even though we’ve never run into any trouble, salmonella or other nasties, I won’t be adding raw spices to our food anymore…Just to be on the safe side…Uff…
Here are the two articles:
New York Times: http://goo.gl/Qr8tIA Scary quote from the article: Salmonella can survive indefinitely on dried spices. Did you know that? No, me neither!!! Bleah bleah bleah ugh ugh ugh yuck yuck yuck…
The solution: http://goo.gl/EI3Jbt
Bottom line: cook your spices! Don’t eat ’em raw!
HEAT is our friend!!! Besides, as far as turmeric (not mentioned in either article, thank goodness) is concerned, let’s not forget that curcumin is more bioavailable when heated…
but what about that nice grinder of organic nigella savita on our table??
this company is 20 miles from my house, I’ve toured the plant … amazing to read about it in this article. Of course I’d like to think it is exceptionally well run. 🙂 But it makes me more secure to know I can get spices from them directly.
For Iowa-based spice importer Frontier, which also packages spices under the Simply Organic label, the threat of pathogens in imported spices has been a known risk for the last decade. Depending on the spice, sophisticated steam sterilization equipment is sometimes used by the company to eliminate pathogens like salmonella. Company spokesperson Joe Coffey says the company also tests for pathogens in an ISO-certified laboratory, and packages spices in its own facility to reduce risk.