As many expecting women already know, extra caution should be used to avoid food-borne illnesses during pregnancy. I’m not on a crusade to scare anyone, but when warnings about contaminated lettuce, peanut butter, eggs, and other food items appear on your screen, you should heed them. It’s better to be safe than sorry, especially during the critical nine months of pregnancy. The latest news about salmonella contaminated eggs attracted my entire family’s attention…and I must admit that we were completely turned off eating eggs for about a month. Even now, my family only eats fully cooked hard-boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, or omelets. The runny yolk sunny-side-up, over-easy, and soft-boiled varieties are a thing of the past.

When the egg recall broke it prompted me to  open Eating for Pregnancy: An Essential Nutrition Guide and Cookbook for Today’s Mothers-to-Be to review the information on egg safety that Rose Ann Hudson, RD, LD, and I so diligently researched. I’d like to share the safety tips with you as a quick reminder, whether you’re pregnant or not. Also, here’s one easy-to-read link to the egg recall story. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ygreen/20100819/sc_ygreen/massiveeggrecallhowtocheckyourcartonforrecalledeggs

Safe Handling Guidelines for Eggs

• Don’t eat raw eggs, including eggs contained in milk shakes, Caesar salad dressing, Hollandaise sauce, homemade mayonnaise, ice cream or eggnog. Also avoid tasting cake, cookie, and other batters that contain raw egg.
• Choose Grade A or AA eggs with clean, uncracked shells. Don’t wash eggs.
• Buy only refrigerated eggs and keep them refrigerated in their original egg carton in the coldest part of the refrigerator, not in the door.
• Don’t keep eggs out of the refrigerator for more than two hours. Bacteria grow rapidly at room temperature.
• Use raw eggs within three to five weeks of purchase. Use any leftover yolks or whites within four days. Hard-cooked eggs can be kept in the refrigerator for one week.
• Handle eggs safely. Wash hands, utensils, equipment, and work areas with warm soapy water before and after contact with raw eggs and dishes containing raw eggs.
• Keep raw eggs separate from other foods that will be cooked.
• Cook eggs thoroughly until the yolk and whites are firm. Scrambled eggs should not be runny; there should be no visible liquid egg. Casseroles and other egg-based dishes should be cooked to 160 degrees F on an instant-read thermometer.
• Eat eggs promptly after cooking. Refrigerate any leftovers, and consume within three to four days.
• Commercially manufactured ice cream and eggnog made with pasteurized eggs have not been linked to Salmonella enteritidis infections.
• Dry meringue shells and cookies are safe to eat. It is advisable to avoid soft meringue-topped pies, chiffon and fruit pies made with raw whipped egg whites, and any custard-based desserts in which the eggs might not have reached a safe internal temperature of 160 degrees F.

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