It's actually cured, and it's not better for you. When was the last time you read a story where the villain was celery? Pull up a chair.
The issue is that "uncured" bacon is actually cured. It's cured using exactly the same stuff — nitrite — used in ordinary bacon. It's just that, in the "uncured" meats, the nitrite is derived from celery or beets or some other vegetable or fruit naturally high in nitrate, which is easily converted to nitrite. In ordinary bacon and cured meats, the nitrite is in the form of man-made sodium nitrite. But the nitrite molecule is the same, no matter its source.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
(1)
(Score: 5, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:31AM
I don't eat a lot of bacon, but when I do, I enjoy it.
That seems a lot more important than worrying about everything that might give me cancer*
Standing at the bus stop every morning is probably worse for me anyway.
* Everything will give me cancer.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:31AM (1 child)
Ironically, it's nitrate that goes into explosives and Muslims don't eat bacon. So when a Muslim tests positive for nitrate (and most do) he can't blame it on "uncured" breakfast bacon.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:25AM
It isn't the bacon you need to worry about -- it's loads of celery.
(Score: 4, Informative) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:32AM (2 children)
Food preservation by curing [wikipedia.org] does not necessarily imply the use of nitrites/ates.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:34AM (1 child)
Sure, but in this case uncured := nitrates. It's not even wrong.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:41AM
I wouldn't know [soylentnews.org]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:37AM (8 children)
No, fuck you WP, I'm not going to allow you to display ads and/or track me to access your "great journalism"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:52AM (2 children)
I share your sentiment, and don't think the Bezos Post in any case is worth supporting, but I block scripts and was able to see the article.
I didn't read it though, because I don't care about the subject matter enough. I was only vaguely interested whether this "uncured bacon" thing was yet another "live to 100 / don't get cancer" food woo for coastal denizens.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:08AM (1 child)
Can't do at the office.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Informative) by MostCynical on Tuesday April 23 2019, @04:43AM
Weirdly, while the laptops at my current employer are locked/corporate win 10, I successfully downloaded and installed palemoon.
On topic, TFA seems to be a rehash of as time article from 2015 http://time.com/4092912/nitrate-nitrite-bacon-cancer-meat/ [time.com]
Here is a good breakdown of different curing processes: https://nchfp.uga.edu/publications/nchfp/lit_rev/cure_smoke_cure.html [uga.edu]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:27AM
I just have the bastards in my /etc/hosts file along with NYT.
(Score: 3, Informative) by el_oscuro on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:46AM (1 child)
You know, if you have a pi-hole, it not only blocks the ads, but also the ad-blocker blocker scripts too. Basically all of that shit is cross-site scripting and shitty sites like the Washington post have ads even when you do pay for them.
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @04:55AM
https://pi-hole.net/ [pi-hole.net]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @05:57AM (1 child)
Oh you followed the link to the WaPooP website?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @06:16AM
Why, is it a thing of shame?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:45AM (2 children)
Whoda thunkit? An alternative, putatively healthy, yet politically acceptable source of the same shit! GENIUS!
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:00AM (1 child)
On the plus side nitrites are NOT known to the state of California as causing cancer [chemicalwatch.com], but YMMV
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @06:22PM
You mean that list isn't all inclusive?
I thought everything was already on that list.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by FatPhil on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:46AM
Anyway curing never needed nitrites anyway. It helps give your bacon that fake red colour that looks artificial to anyone who likes home-cured meat using more traditional recipes, but that's about all, and why would you want that? I can only imaging this is in the USA, I've not read TFA.
Then again, the EU just made sauna-smoked hams and sausages illegal, so fuck them too.
I'll have my cancer-slabs nice and smoky please.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:08AM (3 children)
1. Seal the meat properly, for example by a heat seal. It needs to resist microbial entry.
2. Expose the meat to a gamma radiation source strong enough to kill radiodurans.
That's it. You now have shelf-stable meat that is pretty much raw. Thanks to science, you could enjoy raw pork. It works for vending machines, US postal service, etc.
Yes it is legal. Scary labeling made it unpopular, except for spices because spices were exempted from the labeling requirement.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:46AM (2 children)
Raw pork? No thanks. BTW - how much radiation does it take to kill your radiodurans? A thousand times what it would take to kill a human, a search link claims. Hmmmmmm. That's got to be healthy. I'll just take my pork cooked in a traditional manner until it's well done, thank you. I'll take my chances with radiodurans.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:16AM (1 child)
Gamma radiation isn't going to leave the food radioactive like neutron or proton radiation would. It's pretty tame from that perspective.
It ionizes the atoms. That is, it temporarily knocks off some electrons. This produces an effect that is a tiny bit like cooking, but very mild.
The spices you can buy at the store are treated this way. It's viable because labeling is not required.
Lots of stuff sells better without labeling. A great one is bacteriophages (viruses!) added to lunch meat. This is not required to appear on the list of ingredients. Another one is pink slime, including the ammonia it contains.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:05PM
or you could just expose it to the big fusion reactor in the sky, preferably near the ocean ... there's some (healthy) bio machinery that
likes salty environment, like vaginas or dead vegetables in brine -aka- sauer-kimchi-kraut and who doesn't like both?
so free fusion power and salty air: check no artificial radiation sources required!
(Score: 5, Insightful) by ilPapa on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:15AM (10 children)
That assumes that "the nitrate molecule" is what is used and not some compound that contains nitrite. We see this argument a lot in regard to table sugar vs HFCS. "The molecule is the same". Well guess what? You're not just eating "the molecule".
I'm not so sure the source doesn't matter, despite the message from the processing companies/big agra/big pharma.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by el_oscuro on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:49AM
The problem with HCFS is, it is very cheap (coming from subsidized corn) and very easy to incorporate into lots of food that shouldn't have it. So you wind up getting a lot more of it then if they had to use actual sugar.
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @04:16AM (5 children)
Well if someone said "the molecule is the same" when talking about table sugar in comparison to high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) then they would be simply wrong. They are not the same molecules: "sugar" is sucrose, which is one type of molecule with formula C12H22O11 and HFCS is basically a mixture of glucose and fructose in roughly equal proportions (although it comes in different mix ratios), two different molecules with formula C6H12O6.
Now if one were comparing HFCS to honey, which is also basically a mixture of glucose and fructose in roughly equal proportions, then you could say "the molecules are the same".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @06:47AM (4 children)
Splitting sucrose into glucose and fructose is trivial: heat it in an acidic environment
So for example, suppose you made ketchup with sucrose. Ketchup is acidic. Ketchup is heated to bottle it. Well, there you go: sucrose splits into glucose and fructose.
This is also how one makes "invert sugar" or "golden syrup".
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Immerman on Tuesday April 23 2019, @01:53PM (3 children)
True, but not relevant unless you're proposing that the human stomach provides sufficient heat to perform that process. Salt is just sodium (a poisonous metal) and chlorine (a toxic gas) loosely bound together with ionic bonds that rapidly dissociate in water - that doesn't mean it's safe to consume the constituent elements individually, or in different ratios.
That said, the human body does seem to rapidly break sucrose into glucose and fructose, but I believe it's by another method.
What puzzles me is, given the bad press, why do they keep making HFCS? After all, in making corn syrup they first make glucose from corn starch, and then process some of it to produce the sweeter fructose, which they mix with glucose to obtain the desired blend. Does a 55/45 blend really taste or behave substantially differently than a 50/50 blend which would no longer be "high fructose" (I think).
Of course, to the extent that there does seem to be some health problems associated with HFCS consumption rather than sucrose, my money is on contamination by othermolecules - perhaps glyphosphate from growing the corn, or the enzymes used in the conversion process. I could easily see the presence of a bunch of enzymes merrily converting glucose into fructose within your gut tipping the balance to becoming a much more pronounced problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:08PM (1 child)
thank you, sir.
sucrose FTW!
"HFCS" sounds like something that keeps water from freezing ^_^
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 23 2019, @06:26PM
To be fair, I am betting it would.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 24 2019, @03:25AM
Try adding pure glucose (dextrose is essentially the same thing) to your coffee and see how sweet it is. Not very.
Add sucrose, and it's a whole lot sweeter. The Fructose half of sucrose is considerably sweeter tasting than the glucose half.
HFCS's 45/55 (g/f) is noticeably sweeter tasting than the 50/50 mix.
As for health -- search for a lecture by a UCLA biochemist. (I'd link to it but, late, lazy...) He describes exactly why and how Fructose is very, very bad for you (about 9/12 as bad as alcohol). Glucose, not really bad for you (unless your body is putting too much of it in your blood, but a healthy body can deal with whatever quantity you eat of it.)
So, sucrose is 50% bad for you. HFCS is 55% bad for you. Yes, it's worse. About 10% worse.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by deathlyslow on Tuesday April 23 2019, @12:45PM (2 children)
My two boys are both diagnosed with ADDHD and for them it's not about the nitrate/ite part but the fact that one is a naturally occurring substance than lab made. If we keep them from the artificial stuff they are able to be on a lower dose of meds. It's a little more expensive avoiding the artificial things, but it does show a noticeable improvement in our kids behavior if we can. We try to avoid all artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives. Kind of a modified exclusionary diet. I've gotten pretty good at replicating most prepared foods from scratch. It's healthier to boot with less sodium and way fresher ingredients. It's a win win.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday April 23 2019, @05:02PM
Healthier, yes. It also requires more investment of time and effort. The question is "What's the optimal trade-off?". In your case you have a strong argument of totally natural. In my case the balance is less purist. I'm afraid I don't understand those who don't see it as a trade-off.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Wednesday April 24 2019, @04:15AM
Brother, it can't be easy, but your sons are lucky to have parents who will put in an effort to finding a solution that works for them.
I wish you all well.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:20AM (2 children)
It's also really tasty and an easy thing to add to a 2 egg breakfast.
We'll just whistle and shuffle along when things like bacon wrapped asparagus spears, and bacon/jalapeno poppers get mentioned.
But, to be honest, we resemble our dogs when we make bacon wrapped asparagus spears and bacon/jalapeno popper.
But, on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog so we're good, right?
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by el_oscuro on Tuesday April 23 2019, @03:52AM (1 child)
Bacon isn't bad for you. Each slice is about 40 calories, 3g total fat (1g saturated) and 3g protein. You could do much worse than having 2-3 slices a day for breakfast.
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 24 2019, @05:57AM
Polonium pills aren't bad for you. 0 calories, no trans fats, zero sugar.
Oh, wait.
(Score: 1, Troll) by realDonaldTrump on Tuesday April 23 2019, @02:52AM (1 child)
An uncured Call Girl, not so wonderful. You have to have a roving doctor, his office has to be in your briefcase. He has to be your best friend. He has to go with you at all times. Rough world!!!!
(Score: 3, Touché) by MostCynical on Tuesday April 23 2019, @04:51AM
Eating a call girl for breakfast should help your diet.
Finding a call girl who calls herself "Breakfast" is not really likely be considered part of a healthy lifestyle, though (even if she arrives with another two girls called "Lunch" and "Dinner")
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex