Feds Go After the Amish

[Formaldehyde]

Sushi itself ofc is not illegal. IIRC though, its illegal to sell raw fish that hasnt been frozen before in the US (or maybe its just ny i am not quite sure). freezing the meat really degrades the quality of sushi, but AFAIK its the law and most restuarants comply with the law, unless you know some chefs well and he is hooking you up with some not so legal stuff.

EDIT: Ah. You are specifically referring to only uncooked fish. Yeah. All fish other than tuna must be frozen first due to health concerns. None of the rest is usually local fish anyway, so you wouldn't want it if it had not been frozen for the long journey.

There is also a matter of season. Even tuna is frozen out-of-season.

 

[Fugitive Sisyphus]

It seems very random what the government decides to ban for our own good. I am sure it's safer to drink unpasteurized milk everyday than it is to smoke a pack of cigarettes every day. Or maybe it is as bernie14 said that the Amish don't have a very big lobby.

 

[Bill3000]

I always notice on restaurant menus, where they serve eggs or steaks or whatever, that they say "consuming raw or undercooked foods.. blah blah blah.. can be hazardous to your health". You want runny eggs, that's your business. The restaurant isn't liable. Slap the same tag on the milk jugs, maybe add something about how nobody's proven any actual health benefits but folks do get sick, and let 'em at it. People legally do crap way dumber than drinking raw cow milk.

Undercooked and raw foods should be banned, too.

 

[LucyDuke]

Undercooked and raw foods should be banned, too.

Why do you hate America?

(Seriously, if I couldn't get a rare steak in a restaurant, I would quit America.)

 

[Formaldehyde]

I'm still pissed I can no longer get a medium rare burger in a restaurant. But due to the FDA being deliberately stripped of most of its power by the Republicans and the laws regarding food processing have been changed to make it more profitable for the corporations, I probably should abandon this practice even at home. Supermarkets recycle way too much food these days instead of throwing it away. It used to be only the ones that catered to the poor and the minorities would stick the older ground beef in the middle or use food coloring and chemicals to turn the outside red again. Now, most seem to do that.

 

[Atlas14]

Undercooked and raw foods should be banned, too.

But sushi and medium rare steaks are the best foods! More on-topic, my feeling is that if people really, really want unpasteurized milk, and they know what they're buying, I see no reason to ban it. We take risks with everything we do in life, this doesn't seem to be one of those situations that seems overly threatening and worth wasting resources on. That's just me though.

I really find overcooked (well-done) steaks, and various other foods to be inedible. And with the way some people grill their foods (my dad being one of them), the char that is on the food actually has carcinogens, which, you know, are dangerous as well.

 

[Yeekim]

From the article Form posted:

Today, just about 0.5 percent of all the milk consumed in this country is unpasteurized. Yet from 1998 to 2008, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention received reports of 85 infectious disease outbreaks linked to raw milk. In the past few months, physicians have treated salmonella in Utah, brucellosis in Delaware, campylobacter in Colorado and Pennsylvania, and an ugly outbreak of E. coli O157-H7 in Minnesota, which sickened eight people in June.

8.5 infections per year in country of over 300 million seems negligible.
Especially taken into account 76 million annual food poisonings.

 

[Gangor]

Anyone who has eaten cheese in North America and in France should understand the value of unpasturised milk

 

[mrt144]

Anyone who has eaten cheese in North America and in France should understand the value of unpasturised milk

And young aging.

 

[emzie]

Hahah, what?

It's a loophole. Unpasteurized milk isn't illegal, it's illegal to sell. So if you own a cow, you can drink unpasteurized milk at your pleasure.

Incidentally, when I bought unpasteurized milk from an Amish farmer in PA, I first bought some random folk art thing. I then was gifted unpasteurized milk. It was never explicitly stated I would get the milk if I bought the thingie.

Anyone who has eaten cheese in North America and in France should understand the value of unpasturised milk

Unpasteurized products aren't legal in Canada, but you can find unpasteurized cheese will make it to government functions occasionally.

And young aging.

Pfft, aging? Cheese is best when it's not 24 hours old. Mmmmmmmmmmm squeaky curd.

 

[mrt144]

You don't know anything about cheese then, do you.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Make sure that the milk is correctly labelled with warnings (like smokes and alcohols)
Or let the "free market" correct itself when the sick/dead "sue"

 

[warpus]

“It is the FDA’s position that raw milk should never be consumed"

Let me tell you guys something.. When I was back in Poland in 2004 the first time I drank the local-produced milk there, I was blown away

"How come this milk tastes so good?!??" I said, as I continued to down glass after glass.

"It's unpasteurized, that is the main difference from the milk you drink in Canada"

This was confusing to me because I thought that this pasteurization process was supposed to make milk safe, implying that unpasteurized milk was unsafe. If it's so unsafe, how come so many people in Poland drink this stuff with no negative side-effects?

Unpasteurized milk can be safe. It is also about 20 times better tasting than the crap we drink here. I support the Amish in this.

Anyone who has eaten cheese in North America and in France should understand the value of unpasturised milk

Man, the cheeses in Poland tasted sooo much better than the stuff here too.. Same thing with a lot of the food actually.. Butter, fish, vegetables, etc.

I was told by my relatives that a lot of the stuff consumed in Poland was grown/made/whatever on small non-modernized farms where a lot of the chemicals we use here in Canada (and the U.S.) aren't used. This is also rapidly changing due to Poland joining the EU and its agriculture sector being forced to "modernize"

 

[squadbroken]

So what? If someone wants to believe that, it's their problem. Suicide isn't illegal. Not should any other personal risk-taking.

I really, really dislike laws "for your own protection". If accepted, that justification can be misused for just about anything.

Part of me agrees with this, and part of me remembers having to explain to my sister that vaccines wouldn't make her baby autistic. She's not stupid, but she was certainly misinformed; and so are many people, because a lot of this nonsense has the veneer of authority and respectability (or the implication that it's stuff that "the man" doesn't want you to know).

 

[Zelig]

It's a loophole. Unpasteurized milk isn't illegal, it's illegal to sell. So if you own a cow, you can drink unpasteurized milk at your pleasure.

No, I was laughing at the ridiculousness of Maryland specifically outlawing cow sharing.

Man, the cheeses in Poland tasted sooo much better than the stuff here too.. Same thing with a lot of the food actually.. Butter, fish, vegetables, etc.

You're obviously shopping for food at the wrong places.

 

[Grisu]

It's a loophole. Unpasteurized milk isn't illegal, it's illegal to sell. So if you own a cow, you can drink unpasteurized milk at your pleasure.

would be a bit hard to make unpasteurized milk illegal...they'd first have to breed cows that already give pasteurized milk, or something

 

[Neonanocyborgasm]

Seems a bit overkill to spend a whole year of investigation just to bust milk. One would think it would be easier just to force the Amish to put warning labels on their milk, which might say "Warning: Consuming unpasteurized milk may cause health problems and death." It's done for tobacco products, so I don't see why milk is singled out for banning.

Be that as it may, I don't have much sympathy for the Amish, considering all the cases I've seen recently of puerperal sepsis in young women.

 

[warpus]

You're obviously shopping for food at the wrong places.

I shop at farmer's markets once every couple years They're not as accessible, obviously. I was comparing Polish grocery stores to Canadian ones.