Since Cross-Bridge Rice Noodles is so hot, do we not have to worry about parasites?

Boiling hot soup, rice noodles that look particularly smooth, and cooked pork tenderloin slices, ham slices, quail eggs, chrysanthemums, tofu skin, magnolia slices, shiitake mushrooms, leeks, mung bean sprouts, pea tips... are lined up in a row... Put them into the soup one by one, and a bowl of delicious cross-bridge rice noodles is ready.

Since cross-bridge rice noodles are only boiled but not cooked, many consumers have concerns about their safety. In fact, consumers' concerns are not without reason.

Raw meat products such as raw tenderloin slices and ham slices are the main ingredients that are indispensable for cross-bridge rice noodles. Whether the raw fresh meat in the ingredients meets the food hygiene standards is the most important factor affecting the safety of cross-bridge rice noodles. If unqualified raw meat is not fully heated or processed, the parasites, bacteria and viruses that may exist in the meat will cause consumers to suffer from zoonotic infectious diseases or bacterial food poisoning.

Unqualified raw meat sources can lead to the following problems:

Parasites

Parasites in meat mainly include the following categories:

Cysticercosis

Common rice pork is diseased pork that contains the parasite pork tapeworm cysticercus. The cysticercus is pomegranate seed-shaped and parasitic in muscle fibers (lean meat). It is soybean-sized, milky white, and has translucent blisters, which look like rice grains in the meat, so it is called rice pork. Rice pork is generally not bright, and there are more or less rice-shaped cysts on the fat, lean meat, and internal organs.

When pork with live cysts is eaten by humans, it will grow into hooked tapeworms or unhooked tapeworms in the human intestines, causing the host to suffer from abdominal pain, weight loss, gluttony, laziness, and in severe cases, loss of ability to work.

Eating meat containing cysticercosis will not only cause tapeworm disease, but more dangerously, the eggs will hatch into larvae under the action of gastric and intestinal juices. The larvae will drill into the intestinal wall tissue and be carried throughout the body through the blood. They can parasitize in the human heart, brain, eyes, etc., causing blindness, epilepsy and other diseases.

Trichinella spiralis

Trichinella spiralis is a common parasite in meat products. When people eat pork with Trichinella spiralis cysts, the larvae will burrow into the intestinal wall of the human body and develop, and then circulate in the blood to the muscles throughout the body to form cysts. After people are infected with trichinellosis, they will have headaches, fever, abdominal pain, weight loss, lack of energy, swelling of the limbs and face, etc.

Sarcocystis

This is an intracellular parasite that is often found in pork inspections. People who eat undercooked pork containing Sarcocystis can be infected with Sarcocystis. After contracting this disease, people will develop a Michaelis cyst in the striated muscle or myocardium. If there are only a small number of parasites, there are generally no clinical symptoms; but when there are a large number of parasites, systemic lymphadenopathy, dysentery, diarrhea, etc. may occur, and paraplegia may occur in severe cases.

Toxoplasma gondii

Pigs are most susceptible to toxoplasmosis. People who eat infected pork and offal can become infected, experiencing fever, diarrhea, anorexia, difficulty breathing, and neurological symptoms.

Fasciola hepatica

It mainly parasitizes in the meat of ruminants, but is also found in pork. Fasciola hepatica mainly attacks the human liver, causing acute or chronic hepatitis and cholangitis. Clinically, it often presents symptoms of malnutrition such as weight loss and anemia.

Pathogenic microorganisms

In addition to parasites, because meat is rich in protein, it provides good nutrients for the reproduction of microorganisms. Fresh meat is easily contaminated by pathogenic microorganisms during slaughtering, processing, storage, and sales.

The most dangerous pathogenic microorganisms in meat that can cause illness include: Salmonella, Campylobacter, Enteroseptic Escherichia coli, Listeria monocytogenes and Toxoplasma gondii.

These bacteria are widely distributed, have great potential for infection, and are highly pathogenic. Eating raw or undercooked meat that contains these bacteria can cause bacterial food poisoning in the human body.

For example, infection with Salmonella can cause gastrointestinal food poisoning, with the main symptoms of acute gastroenteritis such as nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and diarrhea. Eating meat containing botulinum toxin can cause neurological food poisoning, with the main manifestations being central nervous system symptoms (difficulty chewing, difficulty swallowing, difficulty speaking, difficulty breathing, etc.) and pharyngeal muscle paralysis.

The right process

The production method of cross-bridge rice noodles includes selecting and processing raw materials, making hot soup, pouring oil, serving, and mixing food.

In order to prevent the harm of parasites and pathogenic microorganisms in meat, the meat entering the restaurant needs to undergo strict inspection and quarantine by the health administration department to ensure that it does not contain pathogenic parasites.

Restaurants should strictly follow sanitary operation procedures when making cross-bridge rice noodles, keep containers for raw meat and vegetables clean, and prevent microbial contamination during storage and slicing.

Because killing pathogenic parasites and bacteria requires a certain temperature and time, the thickness of the meat slices should be 1.5-2.0 mm, the temperature of the hot soup should be higher than 86°C, and the temperature of the oil poured on the soup should reach 100-110°C. When eating, consumers put the raw meat slices and vegetables in first. After 1 minute, put in the cooked ingredients and finally the rice noodles.

As long as the producers and sellers of Cross-Bridge Rice Noodles ensure that the selection and processing of raw materials and auxiliary materials comply with food safety and hygiene standards, and consumers can consume them in the correct way, Cross-Bridge Rice Noodles can be eaten with confidence.