Turns out you shouldn’t eat raw cookie dough

Turns out the best bit of baking isn't great for you health.

This week the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it was unsafe to eat raw cookie dough. Even if your batter didn't include raw eggs. Apparently, not only do those guilty mouthfuls expose you to salmonella, but in ingesting raw flour, people leave themselves at risk to E. Coli and other bacteria. Writing in a consumer update that was released on Tuesday, the FDA said dozens of people in the United States have been sickened by the Shiga toxin-producing E. coli O121 after they ate raw flour. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 38 people were infected in 20 states with illnesses starting in December. Going by their report, raw flour samples taken from a General Mills factory in Kansas were found to have a of E. coli that could lead to symptoms including bloody diarrhoea and abdominal cramps. "Flour is derived from a grain that comes directly from the field and typically is not treated to kill bacteria," said Leslie Smoot, a senior adviser in the FDA's Office of Food Safety, in a statement. The best way to avoid any potential illness? Cooking your cookie dough. Could this be the end of licking the spoon after a big baking session? Or do the odds of 38 people getting ill in six months not phase you?