No Spinach For You!

Students seeking to be “strong to the finich” like Popeye the Sailor Man by eating their spinach are going to have to find an alternative source of iron.

According to Crista Martin, the assistant director for marketing for Harvard University Dining Services (HUDS), Harvard’s residential dining halls will be completely spinach-free for now, a result of the recent E. coli outbreak nationwide. As of Sunday, 109 people had fallen ill, and one woman died as a result of the E. coli bacterium that federal officials have traced back to tainted fresh spinach.

“Until we get word from the [Food and Drug Administration] and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health that it’s safe to resume eating spinach, it’s best to clear it all off,” Martin said.

Martin said that HUDS chefs would do everything they could to provide variety to the salad bar and find substitute products but that safety was the number one concern.

“We will work with our produce purveyors to see what’s available, and we will do the best we can to keep providing variety, but wellness and safety are more important at this point,” Martin said.

Among the products that Martin said will now be off the HUDS menu are baby spinach, mesclun greens, and creamed or cooked spinach.

While Massachusetts is not among the 19 states that have reported E. coli cases linked to the tainted spinach, Natural Selection Foods LLC—the world’s largest producer of organic produce and the company linked to the outbreak—has recalled 34 brands that are distributed throughout the country.

According to David Acheson, the chief medical officer with the Food and Drug Administration, it is still unclear at this time when or how the spinach was contaminated and when people could safely resume eating fresh spinach.

Although some students said that the current spinach ban would slightly alter their eating habits, most appeared to be taking it in stride.

“I just compensate by eating other vegetables,” said Aditi Mallick ’08, who is a vegetarian. “There are enough options where it’s not devastating.”

Some students even took a comical attitude towards the lack of spinach in their diets. Alisa A. Mueller ’07 lamented her inability to be like Popeye.

“I’m devastated. As a child I liked Popeye, and he liked spinach,” Mueller said.

Andrew J. Bestwick ’07 called for “free-trade spinach” even though the vast majority of spinach comes from California and the current outbreak has nothing to do with trade practices.

“This is all the more reason why we need to get fair-trade spinach,” Bestwick said.

In addition to looking out for students’ health, Martin said that HUDS will be introducing a variety of minor menu changes this year in response to student surveys last spring.

Martin said students can expect to see seafood served in the dining halls more frequently and do-it-yourself vegetarian and vegan stations.

—Material from the Associated Press was used in this story.

—Staff writer Evan M. Vittor can be reached at evittor@fas.harvard.edu.