I read "Fast Food Nation" by Eric Schlosser a couple of years back and it really opened my eyes to where our food comes from. Read that, then enjoy an Angus Deluxe.
Incidentally, I also read that E.Coli 0157:H7 was first identified as a pathogen only in 1982! Before 1982, it wasn't around! It's been theorized that the large feed lots out west introduced it to cattle by causing cattle to ingest the waste of infected cattle. It lives only in a cow's colon, and thus can only be introduced into the food supply from improper butchering and dressing of BEEF. Remove the innards wrong, and you get poop all over your angus deluxe. You then must rely on the meat processor to properly clean the meat before grinding it. What does a minimum-wage factory worker in Argentina care about some kid's hamburger in America? We put quite a lot of trust in minimum-wage workers in fast food restaurants too to ensure the hamburger they serve is thoroughly cooked (Do they even know why?).
I got the measles while cooking at a fast food restaurant while in college, and they still wanted (demanded) me to work there because they were too busy to give me time off. I can't imagine how many people I could have infected had I not asked the doctor to intervene.
The problem I see is that all along the line, people are paid next to minimum wage to ensure the meat they process is clean enough to be eaten by a five-year-old in a fast food restaurant.
My friend saw with his own eyes a beef processing plant where they packaged frozen hamburg and the operator of the meat grinder dropped a beef heart on the floor and picked it up and threw it into the machine. Yum!
I don't have anything against fast food restaurants per se, but I do think people should have some idea where their food comes from. There are a couple of butchers in the area, and I know of two farmers in Wolfeboro who feed their beef mostly grass from their fields, and take their cattle / pigs / chickens to a local butcher, where there is much less danger of E.Coli because he owns the shop and cares about it's sanitation and the health of his patrons.
Okay, I'm getting off my soap box and looking for a quick lunch.
