# Pregnancy and Caesar's Salad **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 26, 2005, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378 "2005-03-26T18:36:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Skott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Skott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skott)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/1 "2005-03-26T18:36:22Z")
My wife and I are going out to dinner tonight and one of the things she would love to have is a Caesar’s salad. However, as the doctor said, no raw eggs or soft cheese. She’s six months pregnate… and is considering having the salad anyway. What effect would it have on the baby if she _did_ get salmonella poinsoning? I’ve heard it said that the odds are about 1 in 35,000. Good idea or bad idea? ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/2 "2005-03-26T18:42:57Z")
No official answer, IANAD, but salmonella poisoning would have a pretty bad effect on your wife herself, possibly triggering the onset of Irritable Bowel Syndrome (basically, taking a long time/forever for her system to get back to normal) and/or some level of autoimmune response. That is in addition to the acute sickness. Can you convince her to have something else and make her a delicious Caesar salad with pasteurized eggs tomorrow? ---
**Author:** ![Skott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Skott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skott)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/3 "2005-03-26T20:25:33Z")
I don’t have to worry about convincing her… she’d rather err on the safe side. How do you pasturize an egg, though? And is it possible that the restraunt would use pasturized eggs in making the salad? ---
**Author:** ![Zabali\_Clawbane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/ecd19e/32.png) [@Zabali\_Clawbane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zabali_Clawbane)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/4 "2005-03-26T21:24:00Z")
Isn’t Ceasar Salad in restaurants often made with boiled eggs? That would be enough I’d think, if they are hard boiled. Why isn’t she allowed to eat soft cheeses? Does the doctor mean brie and the like? Is she allowed cheeses like cheddar and monteray jack? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Primaflora](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/898d66/32.png) [@Primaflora](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Primaflora)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/5 "2005-03-26T21:41:49Z")
It’s not salmonella that is the problem. It’s listeria. Soft cheeses such as camembert, raw eggs, sushi, ummmmm a whole raft of other foods can carry listeria. Listeria is dangerous for people with compromised immune systems and pregnant women and their foetuses. It can lead to stillbirth. It really depends on what is in the caesar salad (and how thoroughly the salad itself is washed). ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/6 "2005-03-26T22:17:19Z")
Pasteurized eggs are readily available in grocery stores here in NC. Davidson’s is the brand I usually buy. ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/7 "2005-03-26T22:27:34Z")
Don’t know where you are going out to dinner, but I can’t recall the last time I had a Caesar salad at any restaurant that was made with raw egg.\* And to the best of my knowledge, soft cheese has never been an ingredient of a CS. - Yeah I know it is tradition to be made at the table with raw egg, and anchovy filets. But none of the restaurants I go to do this, it is always brought out already prepared, which means they are using a bottled dressing. Needless to say there are no raw eggs in a bottled dressing. My advice? Enjoy. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/8 "2005-03-26T23:12:20Z")
> [@Rick](#): > > Needless to say there are no raw eggs in a bottled dressing. Are you sure about that? Almost all bottled caesar dressings list egg yolks among the ingredients. I found only one that specified _dried_ egg yolks. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2005, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/9 "2005-03-26T23:56:32Z")
You could certainly ask the server to find out if there are raw eggs involved. But if no one in the restaurant is certain, err on the side of caution and eat something else. The risk may be small, but it still seems like a foolish risk to take, all things considered. Good luck! ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/10 "2005-03-27T00:07:05Z")
The restaurant is almost guarenteed to a) Buy pasteurised eggs or b) use coddled eggs which look like raw ones but have been cooked for a minute. Also, the only cheese used is parmesan. So FWIW, it should be perfectly safe. If your still worried, tell the waiter that your wife is pregnant and could the chef make sure the egg is coddled before serving. ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/11 "2005-03-27T00:07:20Z")
Fairly sure, if the egg yolks were raw and not pasteurized what would keep the eggs from going bad in the bottle while it was sitting on the shelf waiting for your order? I just checked my bottle of Caesar and it mentions both egg and egg yolk. No mention of pasteurization, but the nothing else I could find in my fridge mentions it either. ---
**Author:** ![Skott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Skott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skott)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2005, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnancy-and-caesars-salad/296378/12 "2005-03-27T00:43:23Z")
> [@Rick](#): > > Don’t know where you are going out to dinner, but I can’t recall the last time I had a Caesar salad at any restaurant that was made with raw egg.\* Actually the place we’re going does do the making at the table… (there’s a huge difference between bottled and mixed ;))… so the possibility does exist. Most places do use coddled eggs (I do when I make it), but that only cooks a small portion of the egg, and certainly leave the yolk raw. I would think, therefore, that the danger would still exist. I’ll ask to see if the eggs are pastuerized (there’s no note for pregnate mothers to avoid the dish on the menu). Thanks for all the info! (Oh, and I only mentioned the cheese thing since that was other half of the two things that the doctor forbade her… I didn’t mean to imply that they were using brie or bleu cheese in a Caesar’s salad :))