05.dec.06
Associated Press
Gillian Flaccus
http://www.pe.com/ap_news/California2/CA_E_Coli_Outbreak_Taco_Bell_265592CA.shtml
Nearly 20 years ago, Taco Bell was, according to this story, hailed as an innovator when it began to ship precooked, pre-seasoned beef and bean fillings to its restaurants as a way to save money.
The concept was called K-minus because it reduced the need for kitchens at the individual outlets and let Taco Bell sell many of its core menu items for less than $1.
Now, as Taco Bell struggles to rebound from an E. coli outbreak at eateries in New York and New Jersey, industry experts say that type of advance preparation may have shielded the fast food giant from a more severe problem.
Health investigators were trying to pinpoint the cause of the outbreak and said the investigation will probably focus on produce instead of meat.
Randy Hiatt, president of the Costa Mesa-based restaurant consulting firm Fessel International, was cited as saying that precooking and prepackaging of fillings at designated plants reduce the number of people who handle the food and the opportunities for E. coli to take hold, and that the method also means the beef gets cooked twice once at the plant and again when it is reheated at the individual restaurants, reducing the risk of E. coli even further, adding, "I'm sure they have very good controls because it's really their lifeblood. It's probably potentially more safe because it's done in a controlled environment," Hiatt said. "Location by location cooking has a lot of variables to it."
Bryan Chin, director of the Detection and Food Safety Center at Auburn University in Alabama, said Taco Bell's K-minus advance preparation method should have wiped out any E. coli contamination, even if meat was tainted before it was cooked.
"Since the food is processed in a processing plant, they can control parameters fairly well. Then it is recooked and reheated at the Taco Bell," Chin said. "So either the processing at the plant or the processing at Taco Bell should have killed it."