Do you have stomach issues in your family?
- By Lisa Soesbe
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- 20 Jul, 2018
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How we prevented a potentially bad situation by paying close attention
I feel the need to discuss this after an incident that happened at a relative's home. This weekend, my family and I went to visit a dear relative, who loves to cook for us. It gets harder and harder for her to cook certain foods for us because of our food allergies and dietary restrictions but this one particular dish with some ingredient adjustments is something that we can eat once in awhile. When we arrived at her house to take her to lunch, my husband, being very observant, noticed that there was a pot of something on her stove just sitting there. I later found out that it was a cream sauce made with tomatoes and heavy cream. She made it before we arrived and just let it sit out while we went to lunch and ran an errand with her. When we got back to her house we talked and visited for awhile while this pot sat on the stove. The stove was off. By now, you have probably imagined that this sauce had been sitting out on the stove at room temperature for several hours and you would be right. If I had to take a guess, it was there from at least 11am to 5pm.
A bit later, we were getting ready to leave, and our relative started packing a bag of this special dish that she makes for us and I realized that the pot of sauce that was sitting on stove was part of the meal she was giving us to take home. I immediately confronted her and asked, "Is this the same sauce that has been sitting on the stove all day?" She assured me that even though this was, in fact, the same sauce that it was "still warm" so it is also "still fine to eat". With my background, (I have taken a food safety course before) I knew that this, in fact, was not fine. I explained to her that you cannot leave stuff out like that because that is when bacteria grows. Then I realized that no matter what I told her, she was not going to listen. I politely asked that she please package it separately from the rest of the food. After learning that cream sauce was sitting out all day, I decided against feeding the sauce to my family. I can only imagine, had I not paid attention, what sort of bad issues would have occurred in our house this week if we did actually consume this sauce. I don't blame her for not knowing this, she just didn't know... because why would she? This was not something that was taught when she was growing up.
Immediately I thought back to all of the times that this relative had complained about stomach issues here and there and couldn't help but think that perhaps they were from food-borne illness due to her keeping her foods in the danger zone too often. Did you know that if you cook something, you should never leave it out for more than 2 hours in room temperature or more than 1 hour in 90 degrees or more? Bacteria grow most rapidly in the range of temperatures between 40 °F and 140 °F, doubling in number in as little as 20 minutes. Imagine how much bacteria is on food left out for hours!
Dr. Mercola has a great article about food-borne illnesses and ways to prevent them. If you are curious and want to learn more, check out this article he wrote: https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/12/23/foodborne-illness-prevention.aspx Many people may not even realize that their stomach troubles are related to what he talks about in this article. If you or someone in your family have constant issues, it is worth taking a look. Small changes can make a big difference.
Immediately I thought back to all of the times that this relative had complained about stomach issues here and there and couldn't help but think that perhaps they were from food-borne illness due to her keeping her foods in the danger zone too often. Did you know that if you cook something, you should never leave it out for more than 2 hours in room temperature or more than 1 hour in 90 degrees or more? Bacteria grow most rapidly in the range of temperatures between 40 °F and 140 °F, doubling in number in as little as 20 minutes. Imagine how much bacteria is on food left out for hours!
Dr. Mercola has a great article about food-borne illnesses and ways to prevent them. If you are curious and want to learn more, check out this article he wrote: https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/12/23/foodborne-illness-prevention.aspx Many people may not even realize that their stomach troubles are related to what he talks about in this article. If you or someone in your family have constant issues, it is worth taking a look. Small changes can make a big difference.
To me it all made sense after this experience. This was another one of those ah-ha moments that I tend to have. On a previous occasion at this relative's house, my son was fed ham, as that was one of the one things on the table that he was able to eat with his food allergy related dietary restrictions. Later that night when we came home my son was very sick. In fact, he vomited up so much of that ham that night that he never wants to eat ham again, which is probably not a bad thing. Poor kid! I started thinking about all of the times that someone had gotten sick after a visit and now it makes perfect sense. This is one of those things that people may not think about when wondering why all of a sudden the family has a stomach flu. It could very well be a food-borne illness. However, unless we pay attention, we don't even realize it. Here is a helpful article that lists all of the symptoms of some of the most common food-borne illnesses. https://www.fda.gov/Food/FoodborneIllnessContaminants/FoodborneIllnessesNeedToKnow/ucm103263.htm
I have noticed that like my relative, many people tend to leave stuff out after a party, which is why I am usually the one to start helping to put stuff away as soon as the meal is over with to keep it out of the danger zone. I encourage you to do the same. This is not only helpful to the host of the party but you are also helping to potentially save someone from getting sick. Win win for all!
I have noticed that like my relative, many people tend to leave stuff out after a party, which is why I am usually the one to start helping to put stuff away as soon as the meal is over with to keep it out of the danger zone. I encourage you to do the same. This is not only helpful to the host of the party but you are also helping to potentially save someone from getting sick. Win win for all!
Have you ever bribed your children with sweet treats to get them to do something? Let’s face it, we have all done this before. I’ll be the first one to say I have done this until I realized why I should stop the cycle.
In schools, sporting clubs, and other activities where children are involved, people reward children with candy and other unhealthy snacks. There are even popular lesson plans used in schools that include using M&M’s or Skittles; after the children use the treats for their lesson, they get to eat them as their reward. In American society, this has now become the norm. Go to the barbershop and Johnny gets a treat because he sat so nicely for his haircut. Go to dance class and little Mary gets a piece of candy at the end of class. Go to the bank and Joey gets a lollipop for being a good boy in the bank. It goes on and on. The people that assume that this is okay think, “What’s the big deal?”. This may even be you! I will tell you why this is such a big deal. This is affecting our children both physically and emotionally.
In schools, sporting clubs, and other activities where children are involved, people reward children with candy and other unhealthy snacks. There are even popular lesson plans used in schools that include using M&M’s or Skittles; after the children use the treats for their lesson, they get to eat them as their reward. In American society, this has now become the norm. Go to the barbershop and Johnny gets a treat because he sat so nicely for his haircut. Go to dance class and little Mary gets a piece of candy at the end of class. Go to the bank and Joey gets a lollipop for being a good boy in the bank. It goes on and on. The people that assume that this is okay think, “What’s the big deal?”. This may even be you! I will tell you why this is such a big deal. This is affecting our children both physically and emotionally.
If there is one thing I am good at, it is stretching a dollar. This is one reason I love getting gift cards for gifts. I know that I am great at getting as much out of that gift card that I can by shopping myself. It is like a game for me to see how much stuff I can get with a gift card paired with sales and coupons. Call me weird but it saves me money! I do the same thing when it comes to purchasing groceries. I have standards when it comes to the food I am eating and feeding my family. Food is one of the most important things that you buy and what kind of food you are buying matters in terms of your health. So while I would much rather to be able to purchase good food than sport a luxury purse or designer clothing, I still like to stretch my food dollars as much as possible. If I told you that you can actually get cash back for eating healthy, would you believe me?
I want to share a little hack I discovered a long time ago that I use a lot and pretty much for any online shopping. Have you ever heard of Ebates ? If you are not a member, you are going to want to click on the word Ebates anywhere in this post and sign up today because it will save you lots of money on anything you buy and if you use the referral link, once you sign up and spend $25 or more, you will get $10. If you are not a member you have nothing to lose because it costs you nothing. Do you shop online at all? Chances are your favorite retailer is on Ebates and you will get paid for your normal shopping routine just by signing into Ebates first and then going to your favorite site. Some examples of stores I am talking about are Target, Walmart, Kohl's and even Amazon! You simply must check this out.
Now, let me tell you about how I get cash back for eating healthy. My hack is to log in to Ebates and then shop the sales on Vitacost.com. Vitacost is an online health and wellness store with over 45,000 products. They also tend to have the best prices on most things. This gives me great savings because I can buy stuff like organic coconut milk, raw nuts, soy free chocolate chips, nut butters, and gluten-free flours as well as personal care items like deodorant, shampoo and conditioner from Vitacost when it is on sale and if I am buying through Ebates I will normally get at least 3% cash back from Vitacost. They also offer free 2-day shipping on orders over $49 so I usually order stuff that I will need for the month in one order so that I can save on shipping as well.
I want to share a little hack I discovered a long time ago that I use a lot and pretty much for any online shopping. Have you ever heard of Ebates ? If you are not a member, you are going to want to click on the word Ebates anywhere in this post and sign up today because it will save you lots of money on anything you buy and if you use the referral link, once you sign up and spend $25 or more, you will get $10. If you are not a member you have nothing to lose because it costs you nothing. Do you shop online at all? Chances are your favorite retailer is on Ebates and you will get paid for your normal shopping routine just by signing into Ebates first and then going to your favorite site. Some examples of stores I am talking about are Target, Walmart, Kohl's and even Amazon! You simply must check this out.
Now, let me tell you about how I get cash back for eating healthy. My hack is to log in to Ebates and then shop the sales on Vitacost.com. Vitacost is an online health and wellness store with over 45,000 products. They also tend to have the best prices on most things. This gives me great savings because I can buy stuff like organic coconut milk, raw nuts, soy free chocolate chips, nut butters, and gluten-free flours as well as personal care items like deodorant, shampoo and conditioner from Vitacost when it is on sale and if I am buying through Ebates I will normally get at least 3% cash back from Vitacost. They also offer free 2-day shipping on orders over $49 so I usually order stuff that I will need for the month in one order so that I can save on shipping as well.
In the words of Ellen Degeneres, "Be Kind to One Another"
