Shop Talk

Food safety worries? Join the club

Are you worried about the rash of high-profile and often deadly tainted-food scandals involving everything from peanut butter and chili peppers to spinach and baby formula?

You are not alone.

“When I heard peanut products were being contaminated earlier this year, I immediately thought of my 7-year-old daughter, Sasha, who has peanut butter sandwiches for lunch probably three times a week,” U.S. President Barack Obama said recently, referring to a salmonella outbreak that has made 683 people in 46 states sick, killed as many as nine and forced the recall of more than 3,000 products. 

“No parent should have to worry that their child is going to get sick from their lunch,” said Obama, who is leading a charge to improve the U.S. food safety system. 

Parties ranging from the CEO of cereal maker Kellogg to Rosa DeLauro, chairwoman of a House of Representatives Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the FDA, have joined the call for stricter oversight.

Let them eat steak

Tired of paying high prices for everything from soup to cereal? See your butcher.

While food makers like Kellogg and Campbell Soup have yet to take back price hikes on boxes of cereal and cans of soup spurred by last year’s spike in commodity costs, beef companies have to move their premium, perishable product in a environment where restaurants aren’t buying and consumers are pinching pennies.