My husband and I had something to celebrate; so a few days ago he took me out to a nice steak and seafood restaurant.

I ordered a sirloin steak. Normally it would have come with salad and a baked potato, but the menu had been changed to potato and broccoli. Curious, I thought. At that moment my primary concern was the potato. Fortunately they let me substitute roasted vegetables, which turned out to be delightfully seasoned onions, peppers, carrots and squash. It was a delicious and very beneficial meal.

Later I started thinking about the broccoli and wondering if putting cooked broccoli in place of raw salad was because of the increasingly frequent news reports about e-coli in raw produce. Two national restaurant chains have received really bad publicity, after customers got sick.

Last night we were all Christmas shopping and ate dinner at a cafeteria in the Mall. My daughter picked a piece of spinach out of her salad and asked, "Is it really safe to eat this?"

There is no doubt that raw foods have more vitamins and more enzymes than their cooked, frozen, or canned counterparts. However, it would only take one experience with e-coli or any other digestive bug to quickly wipe out all the benefits.

Mike and I lamented a year or so ago that about the only vegetable you can get in the currently popular restaurants is salad. They mostly serve sandwiches or pastas or potatoes. Very few offer any vegetable beyond lettuce and it's accompaniments. If restaurants become skittish about raw produce and stop serving salad, what will the Type Os do?

I almost ended my blog with that last question mark, but I feel compelled to add one more thought. If you only buy organic, and only eat in organic restaurants, do not kid yourself that you are safe. Because of the nature of organic fertilizers, improperly washed organic produce probably carries a higher risk than improperly washed commercial produce.