Salmonella - it's what's for dinner!

Somehow, I’ve made it through 21 years of life without once trying a chicken pot pie. I’ve unintentionally denied my taste buds the experience of this dish always pictured on frozen-dinner boxes as a flaky crust exploding with chicken morsels, green peas, carrots and some unidentified gooey filling. Chicken pot pie could be my future favorite meal. It could also trigger my gag reflex. Either way, I’m not planning on exploring my body’s reaction to this cousin of casserole any time soon, at least not the frozen dinner version by ConAgra Foods Inc.

On Wednesday, the company asked stores nation-wide to take their Banquet brand chicken pot pies off the frozen-food shelves. It seems an extra surprise in these pies gave some customers more of a chicken-pot-pie explosion than they bargained for. The secret ingredient—salmonella.

Salmonella is bacteria that, when ingested, can cause nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, diarrhea, fever and chills. As of Wednesday, the frozen dinners had been linked to 152 cases of salmonella in 31 states, including 20 hospitalizations.

Although 152 select people throughout the U.S. might disagree, I find my own apathy to the news more disturbing than the actual outbreak. Salmonella—so what? Last month it was Topps Meat Co. and 21.7 million pounds of E. coli-infested hamburger meat. Before that, salmonella scares recalled spinach, cantaloupe, peanut butter (also a ConAgra Food Inc. product) and a supposedly-popular snack called Veggie Booty. Yawn. Even our pets have had their fair share of contamination with the recall of Bravo! cat and dog food for, you guessed it, salmonella.

So, what’s the deal? Why the seemingly constant influx of contaminated foods? Isn’t that why we have organizations like the FDA and the USDA?

In February, when Peter Pan peanut butter was banned to never-never land, I remember actually caring. My roommates and I checked the serial numbers on our two unopened jars and found matches (Publix had just had a two for one special on Peter Pan brands. Impeccable timing or just suspicious?). We didn’t throw the peanut butter out right away, don’t ask me why, but I remember making a point not to eat it.

Today, if my freezer was erupting (sorry, I can’t help it) with the red boxes of Banquet’s chicken pot pies, I might have decided to take my chances against salmonella. I might have regretted it later, but all the same, something is wrong when a warning for food poisoning is old news.