BBQ & Grilling Minneapolis MN

Food as Medicine - Good Eats, Summer Grilling

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By Evelyn Spence

You’ve made the potato salad, chilled the beer, and covered the patio table with a red-and-white checkered tablecloth. On the grill, steaks and burgers sizzle over white-hot coals. What’s wrong with this picture? Nothing—except for the sizzling. If that meat sits on the barby over too high a temperature for too long, it can harbor newly created carcinogens.

At high heat, the protein in beef, pork, poultry, and fish reacts with a compound in muscles called creatine to form cancer-causing heterocyclic amines (HCAs). The longer the cooking time at this high temperature, the more HCAs form. Numerous studies, published everywhere from the American Journal of Epidemiology to Nutrition and Cancer and Mutation Research, have found an association between eating barbequed, well-done, or fried meats and an increased risk for cancers of the breast, pancreas, stomach, and colon.

To add fuel to the proverbial fire, another set of carcinogens, called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), form when fat or juice from the meat drips onto the coals and burns. The PAHs rise in the smoke and come to rest on the grilling food. Research on animals has shown exposure to PAHs damages the reproductive system and skin, impairs the ability to fight disease, and increases cancer risk. As for PAHs’ risk to humans, “We’re talking about more of an association with cancer rather than a proven risk, and we’re still learning, but it’s still a good idea to reduce your exposure however you can,” says Mark Knize, an analytical chemist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, who has spent a decade studying carcinogens in grilling. “After all, back in the day, people didn’t know the danger of secondhand smoke either, and we liken this situation to that.”

But don’t chuck your Weber just yet. Thankfully, a few simple adjustments to your outdoor-cooking routine can reduce or even eliminate carcinogens in your barbequed food.

Lean, mean grilling machine
Start by choosing your meat wisely. Fatty cuts of beef and pork, followed by chicken with the skin still on it, pose the most risk. “A lot of chemicals in the fat drip off, hit the briquettes, and then get infused into the meat when there are flare-ups,” says Dave Grotto, nutrition director for the Block Center for Integrative Cancer Care in Illinois and a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. So trim off the fat, remove any skin, and choose low-fat cuts like flank steak.

Fish, especially leaner choices such as sole, halibut, or bass, are much safer than red meats and poultry. Safer still—grilled vegetables and fruit. “Veggies and fruit don’t have the same chemical precursors, especially the creatine, that red meat or chicken or even fatty fish does, which means carcinogens don’t form,” says Bill Jameson, director of the Report on Carcinogens for the National Toxicology Program. Dairy, eggs, soy products like tofu, and organ meats like liver also pretty much lack the buildin...

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