I really appreciate everyone's input here. Great stuff.
I have this fabulous one--I believe the culprit was right here in West Memphis Ar--but this lady worked in a bakery of some kind--and this must have been pre 1990 'cause that's as far as my local newspaper goes back in the archives --anyhow--
This chick put ex-lax--kid you not it was in the newspaper--into the cake icing. Oh my oh my. She was prosecuted and jailed--mighta been fined too but can you possibly imagine this?
This was a long time ago but wow huh.
I've read or heard of a study that says the effects of food poisoning do not leave us. That they stay with us. Now you don't have to believe that I'm just saying I've read/heard that.
Like especially the really bad cases like what's the real bad meat one, not mad cow, but the other really bad one--that stuff stays in the body. You can get it from poorly cooked hamburger.
You are right, my doctor told me that exact same thing when I got diagnosed with bacterial overgrowth in my large intestine. She said that it was from food poisoning, probably several years ago (Red Lobster, several years ago, I was in the hospital for 3 days!) and that the baceteria had all collected in my intestine and that was causing me to have problems (I wont go into detail). Once I took 3 courses of heavy duty antibiotics, I was fine.
But it really is scary going out to eat these days. It could be the cake, the server, the busboy, the little kid sitting next to you, the person who just wants a tiny taste of that, etc..
But it really is scary going out to eat these days. It could be the cake, the server, the busboy, the little kid sitting next to you, the person who just wants a tiny taste of that, etc..
I shudder to think, that if we are scared today with modern safety standards, how bad it must have been "back then" 1800s and before!
Ok so I have a question lets say people where to get food poisoning from something they ate at a wedding once the wedding is over how in the heck are they ever going to tell what it was they got sick off of? Just curious....
Oh they'd just sue everybody to make sure they caught the right fish in the net! 
Ok so I have a question lets say people where to get food poisoning from something they ate at a wedding once the wedding is over how in the heck are they ever going to tell what it was they got sick off of? Just curious....
Usually food poisoning will affect more than one person, and it gets reported to the health department. Then they can start trying to figure out what food everyone who got sick ate. It's like the salmonella in the peanut butter, they had to track down what was making people sick and then they could look for the source.
You are right, my doctor told me that exact same thing when I got diagnosed with bacterial overgrowth in my large intestine. She said that it was from food poisoning, probably several years ago (Red Lobster, several years ago, I was in the hospital for 3 days!) and that the baceteria had all collected in my intestine and that was causing me to have problems (I wont go into detail). Once I took 3 courses of heavy duty antibiotics, I was fine.
That's really interesting. My husband had food poisoning a few years ago (he ate a pecan pie that had been sitting out all day at his work). Last year he started having some digestive issues and insisted that everything he ate tasted like yeast. He wouldn't go to the doctor so we treated it herbally.
Ok--I have a life long history of gastrointestinal issues--that's tmi already so 'nuff said that.
Activated charcoal is a product that I cannot live without. It's over the counter. It is the best for gas and that kind of discomfort. If you take it during the day then at night before you go to bed and in the morning--you will be a new person.
It is often recommended for food poisoning--after the other drugs and etc.
It is wonderful stuff.
Texas, did you guys use any of that for your husband???
(It is available online and at Walgreen's.)
There's a bakery here that delivered a cake that had mold inside of it. The caterer cut into it and couldn't serve it. Don't know if that resulted in a lawsuit or not, but yuck!
My Wilton instructor told us to never frost a frozen cake. Since the icing seals in the moisture, it's a good place for mold to grow. Obviously, this is only going to be the case if it's frosted frozen, then left to sit for a good long while, but it still scared me enough to not do it.
mold takes quite a few days to develop. I freeze my cakes all the time and ice them partially frozen to seal in the moisture and they handle much better. My cakes don't last a day let alone sit around long enough to develop mold! A cake that develops mold has been sitting around for quite some time! Even a cake that has never been frozen can develop mold, you don't know for sure that the cake in that story was ever frozen. It is about it sitting long enough in the right conditions to get mold, it doesn't happen in hours, it happens in days!
Kate,
He took oil of oregano, grapefruit seed extract, acidophilus, and ginger. The oil of oregano and grapefruit seed extract are good for fighting infection and viruses, the acidophilus helps to replace healthy flora in the gut, and the ginger was to settle his stomach because the oregano is pretty hard to take. He also increased his water and fiber intake.
I had never thought about the food poisoning causing trouble later on. I was too busy gloating because I had always told him that he would get sick if he ate people's garbage at work, and then he did.
I've never heard of taking activated charcoal. I'll have to read about it 
whoever started this sounds like a crime show investigation, CSI or something....very odd and wierd
It came out of a discussion in another thread.
I've been an insurance adjuster for years and supervise food claims for a national insurance carrier. I have to admit I have seen it all. One of the most memorable was a claim I where a lady went into a grocery store to get a cake for her 16 year old son's birthday. At the bakery case she looks at the cakes in the cooler and then took the display sheet cake off the counter on top of the cooler which she then took it to the register. There was no tag on the cake so the cashier had to check with the bakery for a sku #/price. The cake was rung up, taken home and apparently consumed by at least the birthday boy. What the store had done was decorate a "real" marble cake and put it on display but they failed to write on the box that it was a display. The cake had been on display for over 3 months before it was purchased. (I could tell it was a marble cake because the pictures of the remaining cake showed the molded chocolate cake was much darker green than the molded white cake and it was swirled just like marble cake.) We did pay a settlement for this, but it was pretty small because although the store was negligent in not marking the box as a display cake the 16 year old and his mother had the last clear chance to see that the cake was molded.
........once the wedding is over how in the heck are they ever going to tell what it was they got sick off of?...........
Oh it is easy to trace really. The health dept. is good about figuring out such things.
Back around late 1980s there was a wedding in the next town. Later it was all over the newspaper how people got sick. (I got really worried as I had made a cake delivered in that town the same day......at 1st it wasn't identified as to who's wedding/or the reception location so I followed the story closely).
Long story short, the lady who made the cake also catered most of the food ....working out of her home. The cause of people getting sick was some potato salad a member of the wedding family brought and had sat out all day on an extremely HOT day. When the janitor was cleaning up he took it home and his family ate it and got sick. Now because the cake lady was the person 'in charge' she ended up getting sued and lost *everything* - her home and all!
Tracing the cause of actual food poisoning, as kakeladi indicates, is pretty easy although a slow process. All confirmed food poisoning cases are supposed to be reported to the local health department by the treating physician. By tracking who ate what, who got sick, etc, etc, etc, and if there were any other reported cases where the same product was consumed, you eventually get to the source. The easiest way to track it is if someone who wasn't at, say a wedding, had the same strain of food poisoning as people who were at a wedding. Then you try to tie down what that person ate as it related to the other illnesses. It's a time-consuming endeavor but each strain of food poisoning will have its own specific characteristics.
Be careful with activated charcoal. There is no sound evidence that it is useful for bacteria overgrowth or other intestinal conditions. It can however be very dangerous if you vomit and aspirate the stuff into your lungs. I am an ER physician and use activated charcoal in drug overdoses (intentional and accidental), but only if the ingestion happened within the last 45 minutes to 1 hour in general. I will give it to a patient who ingested some particularly dangerous med (like tylenol or certain tricyclic antidepressants) longer out from ingestion, but the risk of aspiration is real and we don't just give it to anyone. It acts by binding chemically to many drugs (but not all) preventing their absorption by the gut.
Most food poisoning is minor, but some strains such as e Coli 0157 can be deadly. Cake is not one of the most common sources, but cakes with dairy based fillings are probably the biggest concern. It amazes me how often people leave potato salad and other mayonaise products out all day and then chow down on them! Fortunately, most food poisonings won't kill you, you'll just feel like your dying.
Has anyone heard of any cases of lawsuits or ill effects from putting poisoness leaves, berries or flowers on a cake? I am doing a toxicology rotation this month and it is truly amazing how many lovely flowers and plants can make you sick. BTW if you ever need to know if a certain flower or plant is toxic you can call you state's poison control center - 1-800-222-1222 and they can assist you.
........once the wedding is over how in the heck are they ever going to tell what it was they got sick off of?...........
Oh it is easy to trace really. The health dept. is good about figuring out such things.
Back around late 1980s there was a wedding in the next town. Later it was all over the newspaper how people got sick. (I got really worried as I had made a cake delivered in that town the same day......at 1st it wasn't identified as to who's wedding/or the reception location so I followed the story closely).
Long story short, the lady who made the cake also catered most of the food ....working out of her home. The cause of people getting sick was some potato salad a member of the wedding family brought and had sat out all day on an extremely HOT day. When the janitor was cleaning up he took it home and his family ate it and got sick. Now because the cake lady was the person 'in charge' she ended up getting sued and lost *everything* - her home and all!
I remember this story .... didn't the judge say that even tho' the woman had not made the potato salad, since she was the "on site food expert", she should have made sure the food was handled and disposed of properly? And that's why he found her liable?
This is EXACTLY why caterers do not permit any outside foods to be brought in ... it's not a ploy to get all of the client's money. It's not just reputation protection (no Sam's club cake next to our custom cake), but it's a liability issue. I actually cite this story to brides when I'm explaining the contract clause about "no other foods".
OK, I have to add another food poisoning claim story. A big church organization had a meeting in Dallas a few years ago in June (in Dallas mind you), over 400 people in attendance. They had ordered huge amounts of food for the Friday lunchen to kick off the festivities to include roasted chickens, potato salad, cole slaw, basically all your food borne illness nightmares. Well, claims came rolling in the following Wednesday with allegations that the chicken had given over 200 people food poisoning. During the investigation we determined that the church had quite a bit of food left over so they just moved it into one of the conference rooms and left it for people to snack on throughout the weekend. Not in a refrigerator, just in the containers and boxes in a conference room! Yeah, food claims are great!
*ROFLMAO* A tawdry orange cake.....*LMAO* I wonder what shade tawdry orange is? I imagine it as the love child of sultry pumpkin and lascivious tangerine.
Sultry pumpkin and lascivious tangerine is the funniest thing I have heard all week!
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/metro/view/20070521-67094/Couple_who_filed_suit_over_cake_lose_case
here's another one! Although, no proof of JUST HOW BAD it really was
*ROFLMAO* A tawdry orange cake.....*LMAO* I wonder what shade tawdry orange is? I imagine it as the love child of sultry pumpkin and lascivious tangerine.
OMG!!! I nearly spit out my drink at that one! LOL!!!!
Okay here is one.
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5737a3.htm
Geez that thallium one is heart breaking.
I'd be very curious to hear the rest of the story--what happened to the former board member. How & why he became a 'former' member in the first place and if he or someone else is being prosecuted.
What a horrible way to die.
Yeah I agree with you k8memphis....I would like to know that also and was the cake delivered by the bakery or brought in by courier? HMMMM
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