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I, as the author, am also surprised there haven't been more nitrate-free versions of the same products appear on the market. I realize it's a privileged positi

I, as the author, am also surprised there haven't been more nitrate-free versions of the same products appear on the market. I realize it's a privileged position, but I'd gladly pay more for a salami/bacon that doesn't last as long to get rid of the carcinogen.

Synaesthesia 9y ago
As far as I understand it shouldn’t cost more. It will just mean that the color is not pink, which consumers may need to be educated about. It may need to be aged more to attain a pink color, which granted could cost more.
- tomxor 9y ago
  It definitely will cost more, longer time to process means more storage, less shelf life means more waste from lost sales which has to be costed in. This doesn't just apply to processed meats, plenty of cheap crap is packed with preservatives, the reason it's so damn cheap is that so little of it goes to waste when it can stay on the shelf for months. That doesn't mean preservatives must be inherently bad or carcinogenic though - e.g canned foods, dehydrated fruit, while things are lost in the process it doesn't necessarily have to make the food toxic. But when you see a 20p cake you can bet it's going to be bad for you, not just because it's sugary, but because it's 20p and therefor must have a long shelf life, and cake isn't inherently long lived.
txsh 9y ago
You, as the author, should mention that stores such as Whole Foods Market have sold bacon and other meats for years without nitrates or nitrites. http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/why-our-bacon-better http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/why-our-bacon-better http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/whole-story/i-love-bacon http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/whole-story/i-love-baco...
- piotrkaminski 9y ago
  Hmm, the first link says: > All of the bacon we sell is made without synthetic nitrates or nitrites. Is that the dodge mentioned in the article where they actually do use nitrates from celery instead, which are just as bad even though they're natural?
  - hammock 9y ago
    Yes
- randallsquared 9y ago
  I think that was "I, like the author of this article, ...", not "Speaking as the author of this article, I ..."
tptacek 9y ago
There is no such thing as "carcinogen-free" bacon. Bacon tastes the way it does because of the carcinogen; further, the only reason it's safe to sell in packages is that it's cured with that carcinogen, without which these products are all ideal germinators for botulism. Products that claim to be "nitrate-free" are lying. They're exploiting the native nitrite/nitrate content of (extracts of) green vegetables rather than adding nitrates directly. Your body does not care about this difference, but your psychology does.
- oxymoron 9y ago
  There’s some discussion of the Botulism claim in the article. Apparently Italian ham producers dropped nitrates in 1993, and there hasn’t been a case of Botulism since. The article also mentions that Danish organic bacon is supposedly nitrate free.
  - tptacek 9y ago
    Could be. I read the 2015-2001 food-borne botulism surveillance reports, and came to three conclusions: * Botulism is incredibly rare. * Don't eat seal blubber. * Be careful with your pruno; one jailhouse batch took accounted for the majority of cases in 2012.
- tomxor 9y ago
  As others have pointed out, it does look as though you've bought into the "meat propaganda"?... cant believe I just said that :P To be fair I think many people have been unconsciously fed misinformation - for instance I somehow picked up the "processed food == mixed up non-specific animal parts" thing without ever looking into it or thinking much. I'm interested.. can you remember where you picked up the botulism thing? did you live through that anti-nitrates era or do you think you might have picked it up from more modern forms echoed around the web?
  - tptacek 9y ago
    No, I'm working from the Underground Meat Collective's Open Source HACCP plan. If you've ever visited Underground in Madison, you know they're not "meat propagandists" (well, not that kind of meat propagandist; they're definitely pro-meat). They worked with the University of Wisconsin to build a commercial-grade HACCP plan for their charcuterie program and then, unlike any commercial meat processor, publish it to the world. You can look it up online --- in fact, you can use it as a HACCP plan for your own cured meat enterprise if you want, which is amazing --- and see where and why it requires nitrites. I absolutely trust these people more than I trust a random British food writer who says hot dogs give people brain cancer.
Theodores 9y ago
Why the surprise? We have had horsemeat, BSE and much else by way of meat industry scandals in the UK. Yet nobody cares! As a Waitrose shopping rich person you could be sold some 'Duchy Farms organic, free-range, humanely murdered meat' and buy in to the concept much like you might buy some other deluxe product on their shelves. However, if down the pub and ordering off the menu, would you care at all about what is in the pies, sausages and bacon? It would not be the place to go full-vegan-socially-awkward, particularly if you were hungry and someone else was paying the bill. Most meat products are quite alien to our taste - ask a small child - but, along with alcoholic drinks, coffee, tobacco and much else that is quite abhorrent at first, we learn to go along with the rest of the human tribe and go along with it. There is a social aspect to eating meat, that allegedly amazing smell of bacon isn't just about satisfying one's cravings for such food, it is also about that social experience, even if eating on one's own. Anyone who already eats sausages/bacon/burgers in canteen style environments or after a few beers from some roadside van is already saying don't care about lots of things, so some added nitrate scare counts for nothing. We would still be eating cow-brain on toast had it not been for how tragic BSE turned out.

Synaesthesia 9y ago

As far as I understand it shouldn’t cost more. It will just mean that the color is not pink, which consumers may need to be educated about. It may need to be aged more to attain a pink color, which granted could cost more.

tomxor 9y ago
It definitely will cost more, longer time to process means more storage, less shelf life means more waste from lost sales which has to be costed in. This doesn't just apply to processed meats, plenty of cheap crap is packed with preservatives, the reason it's so damn cheap is that so little of it goes to waste when it can stay on the shelf for months. That doesn't mean preservatives must be inherently bad or carcinogenic though - e.g canned foods, dehydrated fruit, while things are lost in the process it doesn't necessarily have to make the food toxic. But when you see a 20p cake you can bet it's going to be bad for you, not just because it's sugary, but because it's 20p and therefor must have a long shelf life, and cake isn't inherently long lived.

txsh 9y ago

You, as the author, should mention that stores such as Whole Foods Market have sold bacon and other meats for years without nitrates or nitrites. http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/why-our-bacon-better http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/why-our-bacon-better http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/whole-story/i-love-bacon http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/blog/whole-story/i-love-baco...

piotrkaminski 9y ago
Hmm, the first link says: > All of the bacon we sell is made without synthetic nitrates or nitrites. Is that the dodge mentioned in the article where they actually do use nitrates from celery instead, which are just as bad even though they're natural?
- hammock 9y ago
  Yes
randallsquared 9y ago
I think that was "I, like the author of this article, ...", not "Speaking as the author of this article, I ..."

tptacek 9y ago

There is no such thing as "carcinogen-free" bacon. Bacon tastes the way it does because of the carcinogen; further, the only reason it's safe to sell in packages is that it's cured with that carcinogen, without which these products are all ideal germinators for botulism. Products that claim to be "nitrate-free" are lying. They're exploiting the native nitrite/nitrate content of (extracts of) green vegetables rather than adding nitrates directly. Your body does not care about this difference, but your psychology does.

oxymoron 9y ago
There’s some discussion of the Botulism claim in the article. Apparently Italian ham producers dropped nitrates in 1993, and there hasn’t been a case of Botulism since. The article also mentions that Danish organic bacon is supposedly nitrate free.
- tptacek 9y ago
  Could be. I read the 2015-2001 food-borne botulism surveillance reports, and came to three conclusions: * Botulism is incredibly rare. * Don't eat seal blubber. * Be careful with your pruno; one jailhouse batch took accounted for the majority of cases in 2012.
tomxor 9y ago
As others have pointed out, it does look as though you've bought into the "meat propaganda"?... cant believe I just said that :P To be fair I think many people have been unconsciously fed misinformation - for instance I somehow picked up the "processed food == mixed up non-specific animal parts" thing without ever looking into it or thinking much. I'm interested.. can you remember where you picked up the botulism thing? did you live through that anti-nitrates era or do you think you might have picked it up from more modern forms echoed around the web?
- tptacek 9y ago
  No, I'm working from the Underground Meat Collective's Open Source HACCP plan. If you've ever visited Underground in Madison, you know they're not "meat propagandists" (well, not that kind of meat propagandist; they're definitely pro-meat). They worked with the University of Wisconsin to build a commercial-grade HACCP plan for their charcuterie program and then, unlike any commercial meat processor, publish it to the world. You can look it up online --- in fact, you can use it as a HACCP plan for your own cured meat enterprise if you want, which is amazing --- and see where and why it requires nitrites. I absolutely trust these people more than I trust a random British food writer who says hot dogs give people brain cancer.

Theodores 9y ago

Why the surprise? We have had horsemeat, BSE and much else by way of meat industry scandals in the UK. Yet nobody cares! As a Waitrose shopping rich person you could be sold some 'Duchy Farms organic, free-range, humanely murdered meat' and buy in to the concept much like you might buy some other deluxe product on their shelves. However, if down the pub and ordering off the menu, would you care at all about what is in the pies, sausages and bacon? It would not be the place to go full-vegan-socially-awkward, particularly if you were hungry and someone else was paying the bill. Most meat products are quite alien to our taste - ask a small child - but, along with alcoholic drinks, coffee, tobacco and much else that is quite abhorrent at first, we learn to go along with the rest of the human tribe and go along with it. There is a social aspect to eating meat, that allegedly amazing smell of bacon isn't just about satisfying one's cravings for such food, it is also about that social experience, even if eating on one's own. Anyone who already eats sausages/bacon/burgers in canteen style environments or after a few beers from some roadside van is already saying don't care about lots of things, so some added nitrate scare counts for nothing. We would still be eating cow-brain on toast had it not been for how tragic BSE turned out.