To do my part in contributing to bacteria-phobia, I asked Doug Powell at BarfBlog whether we pregnant folks should be eating Baskin-Robbins soft serve ice cream (see my post). The company gave away soft serve cones yesterday (“Bump Day”) to pregnant customers.
Powell recommends avoiding the soft serve treat. He mentioned soft serve as being on the “avoid” list in Australia and describes the “dirty machine” problem I speculated about. He also poked Baskin-Robbins’ celebrity spokesperson:
I have no idea why they targeted expectant moms, or why they recruited a pregnant Tori Spelling as spokesthingy.
After making the celebrity news rounds today because of Powell’s post, Baskin Robbins says the only risk of listeria is from improper pasteurization. Of course, that assumes the employees know how to clean out the machines.
I asked a food safety expert here in California if I faced a greater risk from soft serve ice cream than from outsourced raw milk. He declined to comment.
For my own part, I did not partake of the Baskin Robbins deal yesterday. With a population of a few hundred people here in the Sequoia National Forest, we have to stick with the scoop sort of ice cream when the General Store happens to be open. We also have the option of making our own.
I will admit that I did eat something on the obsessively-avoid list and was somewhat pleased that food obsession does not yet rule my pregnancy. For some of us, I expect the obsession holds a greater risk than the potential for bacteria. (But yes, I am still pretty obsessive.)
@ Amazon.
