By Colleen Rothe

I never realized how much peanuts are in our everyday food consumption. Everything from simple peanut butter, to brownies, cakes, pies, candy, cookies, crackers, donuts, dressings and seasonings all have peanut paste in them or potentially in them.

Yes, we’re playing the “potential” game now when it comes to the recent peanut butter paste tainting and subsequent recalls. It all started in early January with various companies who use the paste in their products and has now reached 44 states with 637 people infected by Salmonella found in said peanut butter paste produced by Peanut Corporation of America.

Even though back in November, the Center for Disease Control noted a small and highly dispersed multistage cluster of 13 Salmonella cases, Peanut Corporation of America did not do a voluntary recall of all peanuts and peanut products processed in its Blakely, Georgia facility since – get this – Jan. 1, 2007! More than a year ago!

The subsequent testimony from PCA managers, supervisors, etc. before a Senate Subcommittee investigating wrong doing by this company has been appalling. They are being accused of knowingly distributing contaminated food – peanut paste. It’s as if the president of PCA and his Blakely plant manager had their mouths pasted shut with peanut butter. They cited their Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination. The testimony was probably the shortest on record of any committee hearing, lasting only about 10 minutes.

You gotta love Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, where at least 12 people have been infected with the outbreak strain Salmonella Typhimurium. He showed off a container of peanut paste sealed with yellow crime tape, to PCA president, Stewart Parnell.

“In this container are products that have your ingredients in them, some of which were on the recall list,” Walden said to the PCA accused. “Some of which are probably contaminated. It seems like, from what we’ve read, you were willing to send out that peanut base (that) went into these ingredients.”

Ya, think Rep. Walden?

He continued, “And I just wonder, would either of you be willing to take the lid off and eat any of these products now, like the people on the panel ahead of you, their relatives, their loved ones did?”

You can bet they wouldn’t. But they simply pleaded the Fifth. They were not swayed into answering any of the questions posed to them, even as news of a ninth death, an elderly woman in Ohio, came as the hearing was being held.

The company previously has said it shipped suspect products only when subsequent salmonella tests came back negative. But the crime-tape-container-brandishing congressional representative, Walden, said that a later negative result should never negate an intitial positve finding. If you check the CDCs Web site, you’ll see that the testing for such things do not have a high rate of error.

As well, a Food and Drug Administration report cited that PCA cared more about its bottom line than about food safety. Ya think?

An Email dated in October 2008 from Parnell to Lightsey – a response to Lightsey notifying the PCA president of a positive salmonella result and recommending the shipment be placed on hold – shows almost irrefutable proof that the FDA was on target.

It read, “We need to discuss this…the time lapse, besides the cost is costing us huge $$$$$.” How much is it costing you now, Stewart? But he wasn’t in the audience to hear victims’ relatives testify.

In the meantime, the investigation continues and people are still getting sick. The smart consumer needs to be aware. Most of the major national brands of jarred peanut butter found in grocery stores are not affected by the PCA recall. But if you’re not sure where the product comes from, the FDA is telling you not to eat it.

But kudos to the FDA for setting up a detailed list of products, including a widget that searches consumers questions. But if you want to know if your peanut granola bar was recalled, just plug it in at the FDA's website. It will search their database for all mandatory, as well as voluntary, recalled products and let you know if you have any potentially tainted food in your house.

When I did the above, reading the labels really was an eye-opener. Like I said, it’s amazing how much of our food contains peanuts or peanut products. It definitely makes one consider where our food comes from. Right now, the best course is that if you don’t know where it comes from – don’t eat it. The alternatives – severe illness or even death – are not worth the cost of that peanut butter cookie.