Monsters Inside Me : Menu Items Containing Parasites : Animal Planet

Menu Items Most Likely to Contain Parasites

By Robert Lamb, HowStuffWorks.com

HowStuffWorks

Hungry yet? Learn all about food cravings at HowStuffWorks.com.

5. ESCARGOT

If you happen to find the prospect of consuming cooked snails repulsive, then their parasites aren't going to concern you. However, if you're in the opposite camp and can't think of a better conveyance for tasty garlic butter, then you might want to sit down before reading this. Did you know that snails themselves sometimes dine on decaying leaves, fecal matter and carrion? For this reason, one of the first steps in preparing a snail for the dinner table is to clean out its digestive system. Snail farmers often avoid a lot of potential toxicity by raising their livestock on ground cereal.

Think back to that diet — not the ground cereal, the other stuff. Angiostrongylus cantonensis or rat lungworm frequently set up house in snails and other mollusks thanks to their indiscriminate palates. And since snails are both bottom feeders and tasty treats, they're perfect for transmitting these parasites. Enjoy some undercooked escargot and Angiostrongylus cantonensis might wind up in your brain, resulting in sickness, headache and even meningitis. Additionally, a poorly washed food snail can bring a number of other disease risks straight to your table.

To be fair, however, rat lungworm is common in a number of mollusks, including freshwater snails, slugs, shrimp and crabs. Frogs also play host. As always, the safest move is to err on the side of overcooking your creepy, crawly dinner choice.

Still hungry? Choose your next meal wisely:

5. Escargot Hungry for hot-buttered snails? Remember that a snail's diet can include parasite-rich fecal matter and carrion.		4. Sushi and Sashimi If you enjoy eating fresh, uncooked fish, just be prepared to eat whatever else has been living inside of it.
3. Steak Tartare What's this, more raw meat? Do you see a pattern forming here? Yes, even classy food can make you sick.		2. Pink Hamburger of Doom The low-rent option of consuming raw meat is, not surprisingly, even more likely to fill you full of parasites.
1. Ham and Pork Sandwiches Interestingly enough, one of the more statistically risky menu items isn't even raw. See what you might be signing up for when you eat pork.

CONTENT