On the eve of the Chinese New Year, the Fanchang District People's Court in Wuhu City, Anhui Province, issued a verdict that a small vendor was sentenced to one year in prison for using a food additive in order to make his products more beautiful.
Here's the thing.
Defendant Li XX runs a lo-mei shop by himself. At the end of February 2023, in order to make the color of lo-mei more vivid and more "attractive" to customers, Li Moumou abused the food additive sodium nitrite in ultra-limited quantities when producing lo-mei food, and produced a total of 4 catties of braised pig's trotters, 5 catties of braised beef, 4 catties of braised duck, and 3.5 catties of braised duck wings, and sold them externally, with a total sales amount of 777 yuan and a profit of 127 yuan. At the beginning of March, the Fanchang District Market Supervision Bureau supervised and inspected Li's store, and conducted spot checks on the braised pig trotters and braised beef that were being sold in the store.
After inspection, nitrite was detected in braised pig trotters, braised beef, braised duck and braised duck wings, which did not meet the requirements of national food safety standards, and the inspection conclusion was unqualified.
After the trial, the court held that the mainland's "Hygienic Standards for the Use of Food Additives" has strict regulations on the use of sodium nitrite, and its residue is no more than 0.05g/kg for canned meat and no more than 0.03g/kg for meat products. In this case, the residue in the braised meat food produced and sold by Li XX exceeded the normal standard by 7 to 18 times, constituting the crime of producing and selling food that did not meet safety standards, and the above judgment was made.
What is nitrite and why is it imprisoned just for exceeding the limit?
Nitrite used to be a legal food additive and was widely used in meat products. Because meat products can be infected with botulinum toxin, that thing is really going to kill people. So in order to inhibit the growth of Clostridium botulinum, add some nitrite as a preservative.
However, the interaction between nitrite and hemoglobin of red blood cells makes hemoglobin lose its ability to carry oxygen and release oxygen, resulting in a series of pathological changes caused by hypoxia in the body. At the same time, nitrite itself is a vasodilator, and if consumed in excess, blood pressure can drop to circulatory collapse, pulmonary edema, and even death. Moreover, nitrite can form nitrosamines, which are carcinogens in the human body. Epidemiological data suggest that the incidence of gastric, esophageal, liver, colon and bladder cancers may be related to nitrosamine poisons.
However, because nitrite can make meat shiny, many restaurants also like to use it as a color protection agent, and the regulator has turned a blind eye.
It wasn't until the Xu Yiming incident in 2011 that that all that changed.
During the Mid-Autumn Festival in 2011, Xu Yiming, a one-and-a-half-year-old girl in Beijing, died of nitrite poisoning after eating a few pieces of fried chicken she bought from a farmer's market.
The investigation found that because nitrite or nitrite-containing tender meat powder, meat water retention agent, and sausage improver are used to make meat products, which can make meat products pink in color, tender in taste, and less susceptible to spoilage, nitrite has long been overflowing, and it has even become the exclusive secret recipe of most chefs.
In 2010, nutritionist Fan Zhihong also wrote an article revealing that nitrite is added to almost all braised meat products sold in the Chinese market, and nitrite is also added to fresh meat in some supermarkets, and even some restaurants add nitrite to stir-frying.
After Xu Yiming's case was publicly reported, the whole society was in an uproar.
The deputies to the National People's Congress and the central committees of the democratic parties have written letters one after another, demanding strict restrictions on the use of nitrite.
Finally, one year after Xiao Yiming's death, the State Food and Drug Administration and the Ministry of Health promulgated Announcement No. 10 of 2012, in order to ensure food safety and protect public health, according to the provisions of the Food Safety Law of the People's Republic of China and its implementing regulations, it is decided to prohibit the procurement, storage and use of food additives nitrite (sodium nitrite, potassium nitrite) by catering service units, which will come into force from the date of the announcement.
I thought that the devil was gone, but the case in Wuhu, Anhui Province, still tells us that food safety problems will still happen around us, and we can't be too optimistic.
✦Today's evaluation recommendation✦
"Comparative Evaluation of Fourteen Snail Noodles" from Consumer Reports.
Test metrics
Objective indicators: cadmium (dry rice flour), nitrite (pickled vegetables), peroxide value (containing oil ingredients), sulfur dioxide (bean curd, sour bamboo shoots), sodium;
Subjective indicators: soup base, side dishes, rice noodles, taste.
Today we're talking about nitrite, so the best brand in this category is "Zihai Pot".
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