Thanks for the reminder about irradiated spices, and for the excerpts from Consumer Reports. Very interesting.

You probably have eaten irradiated food unknowingly, as many spices are irradiated. (Consumer Reports, cited below, says “Since 1985, the government has approved irradiation of spices, fruits, vegetables, pork, and poultry. In 1997 irradiation was OK’d for beef, and in 2000 for fresh eggs.”) The more research I do, casually or intentionally, the less I like irradiation.

Consumer Reports’ study: “In our tests of more than 500 meat samples from groceries in 60 cities-the largest test of its kind-we found that irradiated beef and chicken have a slight off-taste and come with the same handling and cooking instructions as regular meat.” Also from that page: “Meanwhile, the school board of Berkeley, Calif., became one of the first to pass a resolution explicitly prohibiting the purchase of irradiated foods for its schools. Its Nov. 6 resolution noted that there had been ‘no long-term health and side-effect studies on humans.’ “

Thanks for your good work.