My husband and I just moved to south central Kansas after I graduated from Kansas State University’s food science program in May and we got married.  I’ve talked him into taking me to see Pixar’s Wall-E tonight, but we need some dinner first.

We thought we might try Acapulco Restaurant, a Mexican franchise in town. That is, until I read on FSnet that the restaurant had just been named as the source of a 19-person salmonella outbreak. My new hubby was suddenly not too keen on going.

I, however, reasoned that after gaining some bad press and losing a bit of business, the restaurant’s management would be preaching food safety harder than they ever had before. The chances of an outbreak due to kitchen hygiene issues likely decreased dramatically.

In August 2007, Donna Garren, vice-president of health and safety regulatory affairs for the National Restaurant Association trade group, said outbreaks were leading restaurant chains to “[spend] additional resources outside of the typical food safety domain.”

Donna also admits, however, “There are costs associated with not knowing your suppliers.” If ingredients aren’t sourced from safe suppliers, even that assumedly sparkling-clean kitchen is no guarantee I’ll be served safe food.

Her quote was included in an article that claimed it was statistically safer to eat at fast-food chain restaurants than to cook for yourself at home.

While the title of Biggest Source of Foodborne Illness – home, restaurant, elsewhere — is still hard to pin down, it can be safely said that both chain restaurants and the household kitchen are still in the running. So who knows where I’ll have dinner tonight… or if I’ll make it out without barfing. 

As one Acapulco Restaurant patron confessed, “You compare all the bad to the good, sometimes it’s worth the risks.”

Casey Jacob is the married version of former barfblogger Casey Wilkinson, and continues to work with her Kansas friends.