It's high in iron and B vitamins, but that is a small consideration if you find yourself in the ICU after eating an E. coli burger. I have deprived myself this summer of burgers from my favorite cowboy restaurant in the High Sierra's Ponderosa. Granted, the restaurant is stronger on the cowboys than on the burgers, but the burgers are a key part of the package. Lamenting my deprivation the other night, the topic of the Nebraska Beef recall came up.
My son Frederick was incensed that not only would pathogens find its way into beef and deprive me of burgers, but that the company providing the beef would actually blame others for resulting illnesses. Back in June, Nebraska Beef sued members of the Salem Lutheran Church for not preparing their meatballs properly for a church dinner. Had those ladies used better food safety measures, the pathogen that was illegally present in the food in the first place would have made no one sick.
The dinnertime discussion was made more interesting by Frederick's recent fascination with Old Testament stories. Could God be punishing Nebraska Beef for its behavior earlier this summer with even more recalls? Would locusts swarm Omaha? Would the Missouri River turn to blood? Probably not, but perhaps some figurative lightning was striking the Omaha area nonetheless. Our dinnertime discussion inspired a painting (below) in the spirit of Frederick's series of "Pollan Paintings." At the same time, apparently a friend of food injury attorney Bill Marler has been counting the pounds of beef recalled and pointed out that 6.66 million pounds have been recalled so far. The Mark of the Beast embedded in a hamburger recall along with all of the other signs of the looming Apocalypse may send me to the Ponderosa for one final comfort burger.
In case I don't return, I leave you with a final message from Frederick (6 years) called "Nebraska Beef's Final Days," poster paint on construction paper.
