Bisphenol A and coffeemakers

[arbilab]

A question arose shortly ago whether bisphenol A was an issue in coffeemaker plastics. I looked into it and BPA is not a component of the polypropylene process. Though PP can leach small amounts of biocides, BPA is not one of them and PP is rated "low risk" in contact with foods.

Glass or ceramic are always the safest in contact with foods. ALL metals, copper, iron, aluminum, stainless, have issues. Iron being arguably the most benign followed by copper. Aluminum is toxic in any amount and readily dissolves in acidic foods, and stainless sheds nickel which is also toxic.

However in the grand scheme of the toxins we're commonly exposed to, the toxicity of Al and Ni connected to food utensils may be considered negligible though not harmless.

 

[sudsmaster]

BPA is added to plastics to make them more flexible. If the plastic is already hard by design, then it's quite unlikely that the item contains BPA.

A huge source of BPA in most diets is from... canned goods. Canned soups (which by the way work really well as a canned good) are relatively high in BPA's. Who knew? The source is the plastic lining inside modern cans. Used to be that tin was used, but I guess it's cheaper and longer lasting to use a plastic coating instead.

Frankly I don't agree that "aluminum in any amount is toxic". This ignores the fact that aluminum is the third most abundant element on earth. It is tightly bound to other elements in most cases, and doesn't leach out easily. However I would probably avoid adding it to food as an ingredient, as in older baking powders and also in some antacid tablets. Guess what? Ceramics are usually made from clay, which usually contains large amounts of aluminum.

Stainless steel and nickel? Well, maybe if you cooked a lot of high acid foods in a cheap stainless pot, you might leach some nickel into it. But then, it might be less than you'd get from an handful of nuts, which are naturally high in nickel. If one is allergic to nickel, one probably might want to avoid stainless steel. Otherwise, I wouldn't worry.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_...a-levels-soar-after-eating-canned-soup-study/

 

[lordkenmore]

I had known that some plastics don't have a BPA problem. And that information on new stuff is becoming more commonly known--I'm seeing more "BPA Free" stickers all the time.

I'm not 100% sure if all coffee maker parts are BPA free. Polycarbonate has been used in some coffee makers, and it is potentially something with BPA. I don't know if all polycarbonate has BPA--but on general principle, I avoid it just to be safe.

The nightmare for me--and I'm sure some others here--is with used plastics that have no label and maybe no recycle codes to identify the plastic. I have trouble remembering the plastics at the best of times, and so I just avoid buying used plastic that's for food use. Past this, I guess my concern is only with stuff I use regularly. If I were shopping for a coffee maker to be used a few times a year for entertaining, I'd be less picky.

BPA is definitely an issue with canned goods. I am not quite paranoid enough to eliminate canned goods completely. However, I have cut back dramatically.

 

[arbilab]

BPA is on track to be eliminated from food containers. One of the worst offenders is microwave popcorn bag liners, heated highly in normal use.

Far as nickel in stainless, wash a ceramic bowl/casserole in a stainless sink. Then look at the bottom where the nickel has easily abraded off onto the ceramic. Even just scouring a stainless sink yields a gray cloud of free nickel.

Fired ceramic tends not to leach any of its formative elements into food.

Aluminum looks benign but it is highly reactive. Ever see mercury dissolve aluminum? I have. It will eat through foil like gasoline eats through styrofoam. I have an aluminum pot and the entire character of its finish changes if I cook spaghetti sauce (acidic) in it. Where did the old finish go? Into the food.

Not looking to foment argument, and everybody has to categorize risks to their own satisfaction.

 

[lordkenmore]

Yes, I think BPA is very likely on the way out for food related use. It's become a huge issue with kitchen stuff. And it's becoming an important issue with canned goods. "Does this can contain BPA" is now a very frequent FAQ on canned good maker websites.

As for other materials: it may be recalled that aluminum has come under fire. Back in the 80s, there was that aluminum Alzheimer's disease scare. I never heard that aluminum conclusively was proven to cause Alzheimer's--but a lot of people quit using it just in case.

Ceramics have one fun side: the glaze. Not sure how far spread the problem has been, but Chinese dishes to eat off have had incidents of lead in the glaze. I now refuse to buy any dish made in Asia, just in case. This may seem paranoid to some--but after I saw the news special on mainstream TV news where they showed how lead in glaze wasn't that uncommon, I decided it's better to be safe than sorry.

 

[tolivac]

BPA was also a scare for Vitamix and Blendtec blender jars-now there is no BPA in their jars.Both are using a different plastic.The coffeee machines here at work have plastic coffee pitchers with a metal bottom.

 

[joeekaitis]

 

 

 

The Chemex coffeemaker is still being made, for those who want coffee that never touches plastic or metal.  I don't have the dexterity to dribble water over coffee grounds before I've had my coffee so I'll stick with the ol' DeLonghi.

 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Chemex-Drip-C...WP7W/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1323619433&sr=8-5

 

[rp2813]

Chemex for a while sold an automatic version based on Norelco's automatic drip design from the 1970's, but uses a shower head type of distributor for the brewing water and pauses the brewing process intermittently so as not to over-saturate the grounds.  It also has an adjustable heat control for the warmer plate.  My sister has an automatic Chemex and uses it daily.  It does have plastic components so can't make the same claim as Joe did above, but it sure beats the hand-pour process.

 

[sudsmaster]

Yes, pure aluminum is highly reactive, which means that it binds tightly to whatever it comes in contact almost immediately. Polish a piece of aluminum and within minutes it has a thin layer of oxide over its surface, which is relatively impervious. So it's likely that any aluminum leached from a utensil during cooking is bound to the stuff being cooked, and it's unlikely that it will dissociate again even if ingested. Still, I wouldn't cook or store acidic foods in an aluminum utensil. I'd also avoid powdered aluminum, which most of us are unlikely to encounter except when aluminum utensils are scoured, in which case it can be quickly washed away down the drain.

As far as the metal marks on ceramic after a stainless utensil is washed... has anyone done an analysis of just what element is in the markings? The main element in stainless steel is iron - at about 74%. Then comes chromium, at about 18%. Next, nickel, if present at all, at about 8% (in 304 quality stainless steel). The dark markings mentioned are quite unlikely to be pure nickel. Rather, they might be 74% iron, 18% chromium, and 8% nickel. While no definite requirement for dietary nickel has been found for humans, it has been found to be beneficial to growth in animal studies in trace amounts. Many multivitamins contain trace amounts of nickel. Again, if one is allergic to nickel, then it may be wise to avoid all sources, which are primarily in foods like nuts, although from what I've read that doesn't seem to reduce the dermatitis that can occur from nickel sensitivity.

 

[arbilab]

It's a Corning microwave browner in a stainless sink but still the same two things rubbing on each other. The stainless leaves its stain on the browner's legs. No, I do not know for laboratory certainty what the composition of that stain is. My sprouthead friend in N CA is who put me on to stainless, but one 'holistic health' site actually promotes it.

Doubt "a little" nickel is going to hurt anything but we're surrounded by stainless so if some of all of it ends up in food that's no longer "a little".

Another bugaboo scheduled for eventual phaseout is perfluorooctanoic acid, PFA. (I actually remembered that and spelled it right. Fun to say too.) Leaches from Teflon cookware.

I suppose we all know that an overheated Teflon pan will kill every bird in the house before you even notice there's anything wrong with them. IINM Teflon burner bibs were outlawed some time back for this reason, and that it gives humans temporary flu-like symptoms.

According to DuPont, breakdown begins at 500F and becomes significant at 660F, well above "cooking" temperatures but easily reached if a pan is boiled dry. That's Teflon BRAND coatings. There are generic (non-trademark) versions of PTFE (polytetrafluoroethylene) which may have poorer characteristics.

DuPont repeats the warning about birds and says their coatings should not be used for broiling.

 

[sudsmaster]

Correction!

I gave out some false info earlier in this thread. Not deliberately, as I had drawn the wrong conclusion from casual reading of news stories about BPA.

BPA is not added to plastics to make them more flexible. Rather, it is one of the ingredients or "building blocks" used to make polycarbonate plastic, which usually is clear and very tough and durable. A very small amount of BPA produced is used as an anti-oxidant for plasticizers, in some plastics, like flexible PVC, but BPA is not used directly as a plasticizer.

Very small amounts of BPA may leach from polycarbonate that is used for food preparation. According to an industry site, link below, this amount is well below the limits for human consumption issued by the EPA.

Bisphenol A (BPA) is a key building block of polycarbonate plastic. In recent years a number of researchers from government agencies, academia and industry worldwide have studied the potential for low levels of BPA to migrate from polycarbonate products into foods and beverages. These studies consistently show that the potential migration of BPA into food is extremely low, generally less than 5 parts per billion, under conditions typical for uses of polycarbonate products.

Using these results, the estimated dietary intake of BPA from polycarbonate is less than 0.0000125 milligrams per kilogram body weight per day. This level is more than 4000 times lower than the maximum acceptable or "reference" dose for BPA of 0.05 milligrams per kilogram body weight per day established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Stated another way, an average adult consumer would have to ingest more than 600 kilograms (about 1,300 pounds) of food and beverages in contact with polycarbonate every day for an entire lifetime to exceed the level of BPA that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has set as safe.

 

Sorry if the misinformation misled anybody.

 

http://www.bisphenol-a.org/human/polyplastics.html

 

[alr2903]

There was a magazine story years ago about a lady that bought some kind of pottery jug to store and serve orange juice.  The acid in the juice did cause a reaction with the jug, that sickened her family.  This phenomenon with teflon and other hot plastics is very interesting and frightening. alr

 

[tolivac]

Plastic water bottles-and for those folks that drink bottled water all of the time?and for those that drink soda from these bottles-bring back the GLASS ones!that may be better for everyones health.Drink water from the spout.No bottled water for me.

 

[sudsmaster]

There have been plenty of instances of glazed pottery causing lead poisoning, esp when acidic liquids are stored in the pottery and later ingested.

 

The most recent cases I read about were with Chinese made pottery. Before that, stuff from Mexico.

 

And I don't know if it's now a debunked myth, but I have also read that one reason for the decline of Rome was that the aristocrats, who could afford expensive lead goblets, poisoned themselves because the wine they drank from them became contaminated.

 

 

[arbilab]

At least we're becoming aware of the potentials.

Even my sprouthead friend admits that EVERYthing is contaminated to some extent and the only truly safe procedure is to eat or drink NOthing. Which makes one perfectly pure for about 2 weeks, then certain death.

One constant is that these various materials have been introduced to the foodhandling chain over 2 millenia, without vetting and ofttimes with very unfortunate results.

Research them, refuse or accept them to your own satisfaction. I use aluminum, plastic wrap, teflon, and things preserved with sodium benzoate even though I know they are deleterious to "ultimate" health.

 

[sudsmaster]

Well, there is a limit to how much potentially deleterious stuff one can eliminate from one's diet and environment. And many elements/substances are required for proper health, but can be damaging in excess.

With regard to lead, however, the case is clear that can and has caused serious health issues over the millenia. The Romans used to add a lead compound (sugar of lead, or litharge) to sweeten wine. This was in addition to storing wine in lead bottles, and using lead tableware. And it was the aristocracy that could afford lead (vs cheaper wood) for various purposes, it was the aristocracy that suffered the worst health effects.

Europe banned lead for interior paints very early in the 20th century. America didn't enact a similar ban until 1971. Lead paint, especially flakes that kids might ingest, is a still a very serious issue. Total exposure has dropped since the ban on lead in gasoline, and currently there is considered to be no safe level of lead in the bloodstream.

 

[arbilab]

I'm almost nostalgic for lead gasoline. Cheap, retards detonation, ideal consumable lubricant for valves. Except that all that lead ends up available for inhalation, sifting out of air onto EVERYthing, washed into surface and ground water. Really bad idea, considering we well knew what lead was when we started using it. Some say the fall of Rome was attributable to lead. Nobody could think any more.