Food safety experts say they won't eat these 7 foods

Microwave popcorn (source/photobucket)

Want to know the foods that the “food safety experts” won’t eat? Prevention Magazine decided to ask. They posed the question, “What foods do you avoid?” to the people whose work is to uncover what's safe to eat – or not. Here's what they said:

1. Canned Tomatoes
Fredrick vom Saal, PhD, who studies bisphenol-A (BPA), says the linings of tin cans contain BPA, a synthetic estrogen linked to reproductive problems, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. The acidity in tomatoes causes BPA to leach into food.

2. Corn-Fed Beef
Joel Salatin, co-owner of Polyface Farms says cattle evolved to eat grass, not grains. Farmers today feed cows corn and soybeans to fatten them faster. A USDA study found that grass-fed beef is higher in beta-carotene, vitamin E, omega-3s, calcium, magnesium and potassium; lower in inflammatory omega-6s; and lower in saturated fats.

3. Microwave Popcorn
Olga Naidenko, PhD, with the Environmental Working Group says chemicals, including perfluorooctanoic acid, in the lining of the bag, are part of compounds that may be linked to infertility in humans. In animal testing, the chemicals cause liver, testicular, and pancreatic cancer.

4. Non-organic Potatoes
Jeffrey Moyer, chair of the National Organic Standards Board says potatoes are treated with fungicides during the growing season, then sprayed with herbicides. Then potatoes are treated yet again to prevent them from sprouting.

5. Farmed Salmon
David Carpenter, MD, wrote a study in the journal Science on contaminated fish. He says fish shouldn’t be jammed into pens and fed soy, poultry litter, and hydrolyzed chicken feathers. As a result, farmed salmon is lower in vitamin D and higher in contaminants, including carcinogens, PCBs, brominated flame retardants, and pesticides such as dioxin and DDT.

6. Milk Produced with Artificial Hormones
Rick North, from the Campaign for Safe Food, says milk producers treat dairy cattle with recombinant bovine growth hormone(rBGH). And rBGH increases udder infections and even pus in the milk. It leads to higher levels of the hormone insulin-like growth factor(IGF-1). In people, high levels of IGF-1 may contribute to breast, prostate, and colon cancers.

7. Non-organic Apples
Mark Kastel, from the Cornucopia Institute, says apples are sprayed very frequently. The industry maintains that these residues are not dangerous. But Kastel counters that it's common sense to minimize exposure by avoiding the most sprayed produce, like apples.

 For a list of the top 12 most pesticide contaminated foods, click here for the "Dirty Dozen."