Sometimes when I call in a carry-out order to my local health-food joint, they put the fried chicken in the styrofoam clamshell while it’s still really hot and it melts a hole in the container. When I get ribs and fried chicken, the result is barbecue sauce all over the Corinthian leather.
The first couple of times this happened, I didn’t eat my breakfast for fear of my life. Nowadays, I just kinda eat around the obviously affected areas.
What sort of vapors released by the container are being redeposited on my food? What are the related health hazards? Has anyone tested the plastic spatulas in the kitchen? Is Tupperware really microwave safe? What about Saran Wrap? Are the risks even significant compared to those posed by carbonized, hormone-fed cowflesh?
Most dump operators aren’t dousing their plastics in digestive acid. Not being overly familiar with the chemical structure of plastics I don’t know how they would interact with the various bodily fluids, but it seems like there would be more going on than a simple passage through the digestive tract with no chemical changes.
I can verify that. When I was a kid, I had a toy farm. One of the chickens came with little plastic eggs. My baby sister swallowed the eggs. I cried. A few days later, my mom held out a dirty diaper and said, “Here are your eggs. Do you still want them?” I cried again (and did NOT retrieve the eggs).
Of course, “plastic” is a very general term, and I have no idea what kind of plastic the eggs were. And this doesn’t address one of the questions in the OP, whether it’s safe to microwave Saran Wrap. I’ve heard there are concerns about the vapors given off when it’s heated. Heating something and exposing it to digestive acids are two different things.
The packaging is probably polystyrene, the bubbles being, more than likely, butane. Chemically, they would be unlikely to undergo any reaction in your digestive tract unless you have a very weird stomach containing superacids or some such like.
You die a horrible, painful death. The plastic will block the egress from your stomach to your intestines, and will fill with gas and other materials, and will bloat, swell, and burst, filling your insides with semi-digested food and hydrochloric acid and digestive enzymes. You will die from internal bleeding and in exquisite pain.
Or what they said.
I sold my soul to Satan for a dollar. I got it in the mail.
Any plastic that will come in contact with a food product, must be rated as safe for contact with food. Your plastic won’t be rated for contact with food, if the FDA feels it’s not safe. You won’t die from eating a small amount of plastic that was made for contact with food.
I’m only your wildest fear, from the corners of your darkest thoughts.
I had a student do a very successful speech on this a few years ago. The bottom line is
DO NOT HEAT ANY FOOD IN PLASTIC IN A MICROWAVE! While the risks are individually small, they are cumulative, they are catastrophic in some instances,and they are always avoidable (unwrap the butrrito and put it on paper, etc.).
Hey Bucky, I wonder if you can dig up any specifics from that speech. I know for a fact that certain sausages are packed in an “edible” plastic casing. Does heating such sausages have any effect on their overall toxicity?
Hey Bucky, I wonder if you can dig up any specifics from that speech. I know for a fact that certain sausages are packed in an “edible” plastic casing. Does heating such sausages have any effect on their overall toxicity?
I can tell you very clearly what happens when styrofoam burns. I shot a job years ago, in a large facility ( who shall remain nameless because I fear for my life). They make styrofoam bowls, plates, etc. The stuff is stamped out of long wide rolls of styrofoam, with HOT stamps.
I saw this funky blue haze up near the ceiling, and inquired as to it’s origin. The employee said, and I do quote," That’s the blue smoke. Today isn’t a bad blue smoke day, some day’s it gets thicker". I asked what it was, and was informed that when styrofoam burns, it releases cyanide gas.
And, have a lovely day.
Cartooniverse
If you want to kiss the sky, you’d better learn how to kneel.
Wait a second there. Your buddy at the plant may have been funning with you a little bit.
Styrofoam is foamed polystyrene. It’s made, unsurprisingly enough, from styrene.
Styrene is the common name for phenylethene, a molecule composed solely of carbon and hydrogen atoms (eight of each).
Cyanide, on the other hand, is a moiety (not a molecule, but a piece of one) consisting of one carbon atom and one nitrogen atom.
Now, in theory, you could get the nitrogen from air, but in practice the N[sub]2[/sub] molecule is pretty darn stable and not likely to break apart.
Polyurethanes, now, are a different story. And PVC, while not giving off “cyanide”, can release hydrogen chloride or chlorine gas, neither of which you really want to breathe if you can avoid it.
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