Don’t be afraid to have a few hot dogs or pepperoni sticks when planning picnics this summer, say researchers at Kansas State University.
A recent study concluded that ready-to-eat prepared meat poses a lower cancer risk than natural meat such as bacon, rotisserie chicken and chicken skin.
The researchers focused on beef hot dogs, combined beef-pork-turkey hot dogs, deli roast beef, deli ham, deli turkey, fully cooked bacon, pepperoni and rotisserie chicken.
“These are the most common types of ready-to-eat products and their use has increased in recent years because of convenience,” said team leader J. Scott Smith, a professor of food chemistry at KSU.
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The project was designed to determine levels of heterocyclic amines (HCAs), which are carcinogenic compounds found in meat that is fried, grilled or otherwise cooked at high temperatures.
Previous studies have shown that humans who consume large amounts of HCAs in meat have an increased risk of contracting stomach, colon and breast cancer.
The researchers prepared the food in the same way a typical consumer would, using microwave ovens, and then measured HCA content levels.
Pepperoni had the lowest content, followed by hot dogs and deli meat, and were unlikely to cause harm.
HCA levels can be lowered by cooking at lower temperature and increasing moisture content.
A Health Canada spokesperson said the department has not yet reviewed the study in detail, but media relations officer Leslie Meerburg said it appears to be looking at a specific class of chemicals that can form during the cooking-processing stage.
She said reactions between compounds that are normally present in food occur naturally in food preparation and high temperature cooking.
“Some of these reactions lead to the natural formation of low levels of compounds such as those chemicals that were analyzed in various meat products as part of the study described on the website of Kansas State University,” she said in an e-mail interview.
The levels of such chemicals are generally low and would not be expected to represent a health concern when consuming a balanced diet, she added.
