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>That's a fine sell. Now sell me on, "this is so OK that we should have a statutory right not to ever mention this fact. Food production is really, really comp

>That's a fine sell. Now sell me on, "this is so OK that we should have a statutory right not to ever mention this fact. Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. Over-labelling is just as problematic as under-labelling, as we have seen with Prop 65; adding more words to a label often actively impedes the ability of a consumer to make meaningful choices. We rely on the regulators to determine what processes and ingredients are sufficiently safe for the food chain and to highlight issues of particular concern. Some people think that FTLB is unsafe, but they have no real evidence for that claim. It has attracted a vastly disproportionate amount of attention, seemingly only for reasons of squeamishness. Regulators are not infallible or incorruptible, which is why it is important that they are held to account. If we're quibbling over the labelling of something that's demonstrably fine, we're not talking about the hundred other glaring issues in the US food system that need to be addressed much more urgently. FTLB is simply irrelevant. It's broadly beneficial, but it's neither good or bad enough to warrant our attention. The grossly disproportionate amount of attention it has attracted is symptomatic of a faddish, panic-driven and deeply irrational approach to food that is entirely unproductive.

joe_the_user 8y ago
Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. What I am talking about is "doing you have the right know what's happening?" What that is printed on the back of a given label is a different matter, you think? Some people think that FTLB is unsafe, but they have no evidence for that claim. It has attracted a vastly disproportionate amount of attention, seemingly only for reasons of squeamishness. Sure, for reasons of squeemishness. Industrial scale food production is complex. Some of the details make people squeemish even if they're safe. Other details make people squeemish and are in fact things to worry about. The relevant question is should light be able to be shed everywhere. Should industrial be forced to openly defend unappealing but safe practices or should industry have a giant hammer to shut up any mention of things with "bad visuals"?
- jdietrich 8y ago
  >What I am talking about is "doing you have the right know what's happening?" What that is printed on the back of a given label is a different matter, you think? The article we're discussing is about a change in USDA labelling requirements. I'm not really sure what you're talking about.
  - joe_the_user 8y ago
    The article described changes in description regulation but it wasn't about whether "pink slime" had to appear labels, since it never did appear to begin with - "finely textured beef" previously could be mixed with regular ground beef and not labeled. Not it's no longer classified as something different - where it seems reasonably clear this is a somewhat different product. And this change was essentially just the last push to stop any negative publicity surrounding this product, with the lawsuit again ABC looming prominently. And in the lawsuit, you have liable laws that give steep monetary damages for what we've discussed - pointing to details that are true and "icky" if arguably safe. Edit: Link to discussion of ABC liable trial from lead article. https://newfoodeconomy.org/heres-look-pink-slime-trial/ https://newfoodeconomy.org/heres-look-pink-slime-trial/ Smells very much of a SLAPP suit imo. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...
- idDriven 8y ago
  To me the main issue is improper animal husbandry and disgusting slaughterhouse practices directly impact food safety. Grinding beef at the slaughterhouse, using additives even though ammonia is used to make it safer does not make it safe. Bacterial contamination in conventionally processed ground beef is much higher, prevalence of multi-drug resistant bacteria for example was 18% for conventionally processed vs. 6-8% for organic and grass fed respectively. If you scroll to the bottom of the article there are some informative bar graphs. https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/how-safe-is-your-ground-beef https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/how-safe-is-your-gr... Unfortunately for consumers the US Government deregulated the term "grass fed" as of two years ago, therefore it now means there is no legal standard to the term and doesn't really mean anything. You have to trust the supplier. http://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/release-usda-revokes-grass-fed-label-standard/ http://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/release-usda-revokes-... edit: fixed second link
SECProto 8y ago
> Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. I agree with this take in general. But in labelling a product "ground beef", a consumer would consider the ingredients to be beef that is ground. Separating the meat from the fat in trimmings is good (use more of the meat please!), but the process is not grinding. If the market determines "heat-separated ground beef" (or whatever) to be less appealing, then perhaps they're right that it should demand a lower markup. It's about nomenclature, not safety.
- shawnz 8y ago
  > Separating the meat from the fat in trimmings is good (use more of the meat please!), but the process is not grinding. What does it mean exactly to be ground? When I look at their product, it looks like it's come out of a meat grinder to me. What does that have to do with the process of separating the fat from the meat which is what is in question here?
  - obituary_latte 8y ago
    >What does it mean exactly to be ground? Not sure what the exact definition would be but I certainly wouldn’t assume it to be ‘ammonia treated slurry flash-frozen on 20ft rollers’. My mind trends toward those old school funnel-top hand-cranked meat grinders when I hear “ground”. Obviously they aren’t hand-cranking the stuff but what I saw on the video on the linked page is far from what I expect when thinking of ground.
  - arcticfox 8y ago
    > What does it mean exactly to be ground? When I look at their product, it looks like it's come out of a meat grinder to me. I can show you some incredible fake and inedible food that looks just like the real thing. Appearance isn't really a good measure for what something is. As for what it means to grind: "To reduce to smaller pieces by crushing with lateral motion." I don't think the process meets any reasonable definition of ground. I'd probably personally buy it, but I'd really want it to be labeled in some other way.
greglindahl 8y ago
"pink slime" is shorter than "ground beef" by one letter, so it's kinda hard to see using it as "over-labeling".
- RealityVoid 8y ago
  But he is of the opinion that whether something is or is not "pink slime" is irrelevant to the safety of the product. Ergo, it is just noise.
Retric 8y ago
Which is ok, but when grinding is not involved calling something ground is directly misleading. If I sell a taco and never mention what it’s made of then sure. It’s only when I sell taco and say this is made from beef but actually mostly contains soy that people are going to get upset. Similarly, if I say ground beef, I would expect actual grinding to be involved not some other process.
- tracker1 8y ago
  Great example with the taco... considering what taco bell and jack in the box make their tacos out of. I also once ordered from a "Burger" place via grubhub... I'm fairly certain what I got was not beef, but some veggie burger as a social experiment. The rating of the site on grubhub was pretty low after about a month though. It's pretty easy to deceive while staying within the bounds of legal. In the end, I'd rather the mechanically separated beef over being tricked into soy. I'm allergic to legumes. Not as bad as some people I know with deadly soy allergies, but enough that I notice. For a very long time, before diagnosed, I just got used to throwing up a bit a few times a day after eating.
darkerside 8y ago
It's fine that food production is complex. And people don't know every process that goes into making their food. But when an individual process is uncovered in the media, and there is a public outcry, the answer is not to hide it from future oversight under the pretense that people are idiots. If it's not a big deal, educate people and don't worry that it's not considered "ground beef" (because, come on, it's not).
- notyourday 8y ago
  Some food processes are complex. Ground beef is not. Making it involves taking the meat off the carcass, trimming the fat and putting it through a grinder -- either the industrial sized one or typically smaller sized ones that are found in the meat departments of any reasonable super market. As far as "but what are we going to do with those other trimmings?" -- go to any Asian or Hispanic supermarket and see for yourself -- they are sold to the same people who buy the ground beef under the name of "Beef trimmings" or "Beef bones" etc.
notyourday 8y ago
> Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. Not at all. The fact that this is even being brought up in the argument illustrates how much the industry needs to be regulated. I had an organic burrito on Thursday because my wife in our old age is obsessed at buying only organic products... largely from a bodega in a Dominican area of Brooklyn -- not even Whole Foods. The following are the ingredients involved: 1. Flour tortilla -- made in Brooklyn by a small plant that sells them to bodegas and small supermarkets. In a strange coincidence I used to walk by that plant and I talked to the family that owns it. The tortilla contains the following ingredients: * Flour, Salt, baking soda, pork fat, water their tortillas keep in a fridge for about a week and half. I asked him why would not he add preservatives? His answer was "Because they cost money and tortillas dont taste as good. Mine are a bit more expensive than the ones from giant companies but I make a lot more money than them" * Ground beef ( could be organic ) She buys it from the butcher that grinds it on premises or at Whole Foods or I buy a whole 30 lb of sirloin and grind it myself. * Dried beans ( could be organic ) * Rice ( could be organic ) * Tomatoes, onions, garlic, cilantro, radish, jalapeno, cucumbers, avocado, limes ( all could be organic ) * Cumin, salt, pepper * Sour cream ( mostly organic but definitely that as the totality has the following ingredient list: milk, enzymes ) That's what an organic burrito looks like. If you are on a west coast, especially in SF it would be called "Mission Burrito". Cheap as hell because it has no extra process inputs. Qdoba and Chipotle manage to make gobs of money selling them: because their COG on one are about $2.50.
- war1025 8y ago
  I believe the standard for restaurant food is that the food itself should be 1/3 of the purchase price. Which looks to be right on target, since I think a burrito at least around here is usually about $7.50
- cwyers 8y ago
  > 1. Flour tortilla -- made in Brooklyn by a small plant that sells them to bodegas and small supermarkets. In a strange coincidence I used to walk by that plant and I talked to the family that owns it. The tortilla contains the following ingredients: > * Flour, Salt, baking soda, pork fat, water What's in the flour? Is it bleached? Treated with a maturing agent? (Most AP flour in the US has been treated with both.) Has it been enriched to replace nutrients lost in the processing?
hndamien 8y ago
You could fit that telephone directory in a link from a QR code, and at least one person would read it when it mattered. Individuals don't read privacy policies, but usually one person will.

joe_the_user 8y ago

Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. What I am talking about is "doing you have the right know what's happening?" What that is printed on the back of a given label is a different matter, you think? Some people think that FTLB is unsafe, but they have no evidence for that claim. It has attracted a vastly disproportionate amount of attention, seemingly only for reasons of squeamishness. Sure, for reasons of squeemishness. Industrial scale food production is complex. Some of the details make people squeemish even if they're safe. Other details make people squeemish and are in fact things to worry about. The relevant question is should light be able to be shed everywhere. Should industrial be forced to openly defend unappealing but safe practices or should industry have a giant hammer to shut up any mention of things with "bad visuals"?

jdietrich 8y ago
>What I am talking about is "doing you have the right know what's happening?" What that is printed on the back of a given label is a different matter, you think? The article we're discussing is about a change in USDA labelling requirements. I'm not really sure what you're talking about.
- joe_the_user 8y ago
  The article described changes in description regulation but it wasn't about whether "pink slime" had to appear labels, since it never did appear to begin with - "finely textured beef" previously could be mixed with regular ground beef and not labeled. Not it's no longer classified as something different - where it seems reasonably clear this is a somewhat different product. And this change was essentially just the last push to stop any negative publicity surrounding this product, with the lawsuit again ABC looming prominently. And in the lawsuit, you have liable laws that give steep monetary damages for what we've discussed - pointing to details that are true and "icky" if arguably safe. Edit: Link to discussion of ABC liable trial from lead article. https://newfoodeconomy.org/heres-look-pink-slime-trial/ https://newfoodeconomy.org/heres-look-pink-slime-trial/ Smells very much of a SLAPP suit imo. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...
idDriven 8y ago
To me the main issue is improper animal husbandry and disgusting slaughterhouse practices directly impact food safety. Grinding beef at the slaughterhouse, using additives even though ammonia is used to make it safer does not make it safe. Bacterial contamination in conventionally processed ground beef is much higher, prevalence of multi-drug resistant bacteria for example was 18% for conventionally processed vs. 6-8% for organic and grass fed respectively. If you scroll to the bottom of the article there are some informative bar graphs. https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/how-safe-is-your-ground-beef https://www.consumerreports.org/cro/food/how-safe-is-your-gr... Unfortunately for consumers the US Government deregulated the term "grass fed" as of two years ago, therefore it now means there is no legal standard to the term and doesn't really mean anything. You have to trust the supplier. http://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/release-usda-revokes-grass-fed-label-standard/ http://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/release-usda-revokes-... edit: fixed second link

SECProto 8y ago

> Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. I agree with this take in general. But in labelling a product "ground beef", a consumer would consider the ingredients to be beef that is ground. Separating the meat from the fat in trimmings is good (use more of the meat please!), but the process is not grinding. If the market determines "heat-separated ground beef" (or whatever) to be less appealing, then perhaps they're right that it should demand a lower markup. It's about nomenclature, not safety.

shawnz 8y ago
> Separating the meat from the fat in trimmings is good (use more of the meat please!), but the process is not grinding. What does it mean exactly to be ground? When I look at their product, it looks like it's come out of a meat grinder to me. What does that have to do with the process of separating the fat from the meat which is what is in question here?
- obituary_latte 8y ago
  >What does it mean exactly to be ground? Not sure what the exact definition would be but I certainly wouldn’t assume it to be ‘ammonia treated slurry flash-frozen on 20ft rollers’. My mind trends toward those old school funnel-top hand-cranked meat grinders when I hear “ground”. Obviously they aren’t hand-cranking the stuff but what I saw on the video on the linked page is far from what I expect when thinking of ground.
- arcticfox 8y ago
  > What does it mean exactly to be ground? When I look at their product, it looks like it's come out of a meat grinder to me. I can show you some incredible fake and inedible food that looks just like the real thing. Appearance isn't really a good measure for what something is. As for what it means to grind: "To reduce to smaller pieces by crushing with lateral motion." I don't think the process meets any reasonable definition of ground. I'd probably personally buy it, but I'd really want it to be labeled in some other way.

greglindahl 8y ago

"pink slime" is shorter than "ground beef" by one letter, so it's kinda hard to see using it as "over-labeling".

RealityVoid 8y ago
But he is of the opinion that whether something is or is not "pink slime" is irrelevant to the safety of the product. Ergo, it is just noise.

Retric 8y ago

Which is ok, but when grinding is not involved calling something ground is directly misleading. If I sell a taco and never mention what it’s made of then sure. It’s only when I sell taco and say this is made from beef but actually mostly contains soy that people are going to get upset. Similarly, if I say ground beef, I would expect actual grinding to be involved not some other process.

tracker1 8y ago
Great example with the taco... considering what taco bell and jack in the box make their tacos out of. I also once ordered from a "Burger" place via grubhub... I'm fairly certain what I got was not beef, but some veggie burger as a social experiment. The rating of the site on grubhub was pretty low after about a month though. It's pretty easy to deceive while staying within the bounds of legal. In the end, I'd rather the mechanically separated beef over being tricked into soy. I'm allergic to legumes. Not as bad as some people I know with deadly soy allergies, but enough that I notice. For a very long time, before diagnosed, I just got used to throwing up a bit a few times a day after eating.

darkerside 8y ago

It's fine that food production is complex. And people don't know every process that goes into making their food. But when an individual process is uncovered in the media, and there is a public outcry, the answer is not to hide it from future oversight under the pretense that people are idiots. If it's not a big deal, educate people and don't worry that it's not considered "ground beef" (because, come on, it's not).

notyourday 8y ago
Some food processes are complex. Ground beef is not. Making it involves taking the meat off the carcass, trimming the fat and putting it through a grinder -- either the industrial sized one or typically smaller sized ones that are found in the meat departments of any reasonable super market. As far as "but what are we going to do with those other trimmings?" -- go to any Asian or Hispanic supermarket and see for yourself -- they are sold to the same people who buy the ground beef under the name of "Beef trimmings" or "Beef bones" etc.

notyourday 8y ago

> Food production is really, really complex. If an organic burrito was labelled with every process involved in its production, it would come with a label the size of a telephone directory. Not at all. The fact that this is even being brought up in the argument illustrates how much the industry needs to be regulated. I had an organic burrito on Thursday because my wife in our old age is obsessed at buying only organic products... largely from a bodega in a Dominican area of Brooklyn -- not even Whole Foods. The following are the ingredients involved: 1. Flour tortilla -- made in Brooklyn by a small plant that sells them to bodegas and small supermarkets. In a strange coincidence I used to walk by that plant and I talked to the family that owns it. The tortilla contains the following ingredients: * Flour, Salt, baking soda, pork fat, water their tortillas keep in a fridge for about a week and half. I asked him why would not he add preservatives? His answer was "Because they cost money and tortillas dont taste as good. Mine are a bit more expensive than the ones from giant companies but I make a lot more money than them" * Ground beef ( could be organic ) She buys it from the butcher that grinds it on premises or at Whole Foods or I buy a whole 30 lb of sirloin and grind it myself. * Dried beans ( could be organic ) * Rice ( could be organic ) * Tomatoes, onions, garlic, cilantro, radish, jalapeno, cucumbers, avocado, limes ( all could be organic ) * Cumin, salt, pepper * Sour cream ( mostly organic but definitely that as the totality has the following ingredient list: milk, enzymes ) That's what an organic burrito looks like. If you are on a west coast, especially in SF it would be called "Mission Burrito". Cheap as hell because it has no extra process inputs. Qdoba and Chipotle manage to make gobs of money selling them: because their COG on one are about $2.50.

war1025 8y ago
I believe the standard for restaurant food is that the food itself should be 1/3 of the purchase price. Which looks to be right on target, since I think a burrito at least around here is usually about $7.50
cwyers 8y ago
> 1. Flour tortilla -- made in Brooklyn by a small plant that sells them to bodegas and small supermarkets. In a strange coincidence I used to walk by that plant and I talked to the family that owns it. The tortilla contains the following ingredients: > * Flour, Salt, baking soda, pork fat, water What's in the flour? Is it bleached? Treated with a maturing agent? (Most AP flour in the US has been treated with both.) Has it been enriched to replace nutrients lost in the processing?

hndamien 8y ago

You could fit that telephone directory in a link from a QR code, and at least one person would read it when it mattered. Individuals don't read privacy policies, but usually one person will.