"In recent years, and particularly during the war, sodium nitrite has been used as a substitute for sodium nitrate in preserving meat. The government permits it but stipulates that the finished meat must not contain more than one part of sodium nitrite per five thousand parts of meat. Cooking will safely destroy enough of that small quantity of the drug....we didn't have to think twice to realize that the proportion of nitrite in that batch of cereal was considerably higher than one to five thousand." (pp.11-12)

"...the Bureau of Animal Industry of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, although it assumes all port to be trichinous until proved otherwise, requires packing houses to administer a prophylactic freeze to only those varieties of the meat - frankfurters, salami, prosciutto, and the like - that are often eaten raw. Moreover, not all processed pork comes under the jurisdiction...