Chicken In The Hot Tub

Ok, so the title of this blog sounds like a song from Little Feat, it’s not, it is just another demonstration of the absurdity that surrounds us–the customers.  We have recently been told that Great Britain will not buy our poultry products because they are dipped in chlorine.  Yes, you heard it right—chlorine!  Just the mention of this process disgusts even the strongest of stomachs.

It has recently been confirmed by several sources that most chicken plants in the good-ole US dip their feather plucked product into a chlorine bath to ensure the “healthy quality” of the birds they sell.  This process is officially known as pathogen reduction treatment or PRT, and it is supposed to remove such undesirables as e-coli and others.   The most commonly used chemical in this process is called chlorine dioxide, there are some other chemicals that can be used to accomplish this mission, however, none of them sound appetizing either.

Experts defend the process as “having been safely consumed for years”, one went so far as to say that you would have to eat over 5% of your body weight in chicken per day for it to be harmful to your health.  Well, it is also said that when you begin taking a new vitamin or drug, you must build it up in your system over time. Wouldn’t the same thing apply here?

Even though chlorine is inorganic, it still contains an atomic structure and isotopes which can build up in a human system.  The process introduces a chemical not normally contained within the meat, possibly binding itself to the proteins.  Experts claim that the chlorine does not penetrate the chicken, sure, and neither does marination.

Here is the real laugher, on some chicken packaging it recommends rinsing the already chlorine-soaked carcass under water.  Wait a minute, isn’t chlorine in the drinking water we use?  Then you are supposed to cook the chicken carcass to a certain temperature to eliminate any pathogens.  Why can’t we just cook the chicken to the proper temperature and eliminate the use of chemicals?

So, I have a solution to this dilemma.  Let’s say you are having some friends over for a wine-tasting/hot tub party with appetizers and a chicken entree.  After you pop the corks and serve the Hors’ D’ oeuvres, you are ready for the hot tub.  So why not kill two birds with one stone (pun definitely intended) and simply take the chickens in the tub with you.  Most hot tubs are so over-shocked by chlorine that your skin almost falls off after ten minutes in that salt-saturated-soup.  Surely this would help cure the pathogen problem for the chickens and would certainly be a great conversation piece for the dinner table.

The inconvenient truth here is that most food plants in the US have weak or poor and, in some cases, almost nonexistent sanitation programs (I wrote about this in an earlier blog).  Often, the preparation surfaces transfer the pathogens onto the food we ultimately consume, so a final step like bleaching is almost a necessity. It is also considerably less expensive to dip the chickens in chlorine as opposed to paying employees a decent wage to do sanitation properly.  Just gives ya warm fuzzies about the crap we consume, doesn’t it?   So, I say something here that I don’t often say; good show old beans in Great Britain!

Talk To Ya Later!

The Grumpy Old Fart Customer