Onions left overnight source of Food Poisoning

Read for awareness

Useful information to share with you. Every body should read this...

I have used an onion which has been left in
the fridge, and sometimes I don't use a whole one at one time, so save the
other half for later. Now with this info, I have changed my mind....will buy
smaller onions in the future...

Written by Zola Gorgon - author of several
cookbooks..

Watch out for those spoiled onions...

I had the wonderful privilege of touring
Mullins Food Products, makers of mayonnaise. Mullins is huge, and is owned
by 11 brothers and sisters in the Mullins family. My friend, Jeanne, is the
CEO..

Questions about food poisoning came up, and I
wanted to share what I learned from a chemist.


The guy who gave us our tour is named Ed. He's
one of the bro thers. Ed is a chemistry expert and is involved in
developing most of the sauce formula. He's even developed sauce formula for
McDonald's.


Keep in mind that Ed is a food chemistry whiz.
During the tour, someone asked if we really needed to worry about
mayonnaise. People are always worried that mayonnaise will spoil. Ed's
answer will surprise you.

Ed said that all commercially-made Mayo is
completely safe..

"It doesn't even have to be refrigerated. No
harm in refrigerating it, but it's not really necessary." He explained
that the pH in mayonnaise is set at a point that bacteria could not survive
in that environment. He then talked about the quint essential picnic, with
the bowl of potato salad sitting on the table and how everyone blames the
mayonnaise when someone gets sick.


Ed says that when food poisoning is reported,
the first thing the officials look for is when the 'victim' last
ate ONIONS and where those onions came from (in the potato salad?). Ed says
it's not the mayonnaise (as long as it's not homemade Mayo) that spoils in
the outdoors. It's probably the onions, and if not the onions, it's the
POTATOES.

He explained, onions are a huge magnet for bacteria, especially uncooked
onions.

You should never plan to keep a portion of a sliced onion. He says it's
not even safe if you put it in a zip-lock bag and put it in your
refrigerator.

It's already contaminated enough just by being cut open and out for a bit,
that it can be a danger to you (and doubly watch out for those onions you
put in your hotdogs at the baseball park!)

Ed says if you take the leftover onion and cook it like crazy you'll
probably be okay, but if you slice that leftover onion and put on your
sandwich, you're asking for trouble.

Both the onions and the moist potato in a potato salad, will attract and
grow bacteria faster than any commercial mayonnaise will even begin to break
down.

So, how's that for news? Take it for what you
will. I (the author) am going to be very careful about my onions from now on.

For some reason, I see a lot of credibility coming from a chemist and a
company, that produces millions of pounds of mayonnaise every year.

Also, dogs should never eat onions. Their stomachs cannot metabolise onions.