Dosing the Duck – The Weird Side of the Internet

Dosing the Duck – The Weird Side of the Internet – by Liam Sweeny.

You ever leave a restaurant and grab a mint? They’re the chalky ones, you know, dissolve faster than your paycheck after dining there, if it is such a restaurant that offers mints post-cuisine. I always figured it was to make your breath minty fresh after that Limburger delight you feasted on and mixed with cherries jubilee. But if you know what it was actually for…

… actually, it’s just a mint. Probably. Makes your breath fresh, all that. But, and hear me out, what if it was a minty antacid to cover up the explosive potential of the food, and they just didn’t tell you?

So we’re in China, right? And two chefs, known only as Sha and Fu, were arrested in the city of Jiangsu for dosing thousands of meals with gentamicin sulfate, an antibiotic used to treat diarrhea. They did this allegedly to cover their asses on the expired food they were serving. Dishes like braised fish maw with chicken sauce and braised tendons with chicken sauce were given one injection of the stuff per table.

They were buying hundreds of boxes of the stuff without a prescription. And in addition to jail time, they were fined the equivalent of $22,000 American.

This is beyond screwed up if you think about it. They were giving people an antibiotic. The things doctors tell you you’re not supposed to take too much of, or you’re a breeding ground for superbugs? I’m sure they had regular diners too stupid to know food isn’t supposed to smell like that.

But here’s an interesting question: could that ever work? Could a chef mix in diced Tums on a dish (a fresh dish) that happened to be a little spicy? Or sprinkle Omeprazole on a Sriracha pizza crust? I mean, chef-pharmacists could be a thing.

I can hear the pot brownies crying sour grapes.

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