hard to swallow...
The end of September generally marks the close of that most traditional summer event - the barbecue. I have to confess to being somewhat ambivalent about chargrilled food. One the one hand, barbecued food has little to recommend it from a gastronomic point of view; on the other hand, the cooking of it seems to be an exclusively male preserve and therefore to be welcomed by those who are usually responsible for preparing meals. But leaving aside the perils of dried steaks and undercooked chicken legs, the barbecue may hold other hazards that are not immediately apparent.
French environmental campaigning group Robin des Bois has studied the polluting effects of barbecues and has found that grilling four large steaks, four turkey cuts and eight large sausages over a two-hour period can release between 12 and 22ng of dioxins into the atmosphere. This is approximately equivalent to 220,000 cigarettes.
The researchers found that the average concentrations of dioxins in the vicinity of the barbecue ranged from 0.6 to 0.7ng/m3 - seven times higher than the level authorised for public incinerators at the point of discharge from the chimney. The French food safety agency is also undertaking research into the possible cancer-causing effect of ingesting carbonised food and has found that some hydrocarbons linked to cancer are incorporated into the food.
Food scares involving dioxins and PCBs are nothing new. One particularly memorable campaign of around 15 years ago was aimed at banning the use of paperboard cartons for milk on the basis that dioxins could leach out of the packaging and into the product. So should we all be shunning the summer ritual of burnt burgers and charred chicken? Will barbecue manufacturers have to start including health warnings on their products?
To be honest, the average summer presents so few opportunities for al fresco cooking, that unless everybody is huddled round the smouldering charcoal to keep warm, the inhalation of dioxins is unlikely to present a major hazard.
But salmonella - well now, that's another matter entirely.