The e-coli bug saga should serve as yet another warning that we tamper with nature and traditional growing practices at mankind’s peril

As deaths from the infection grew, Spanish cucumbers took on the dimension of potential weapons of mass destruction. It was blamed as the source of a new and even deadlier strain of this dreadful disease, and relations between Spain and Germany were at breaking point.

The already troubled Spanish economy was hit further when the bottom fell out of the lucrative salads market. To the east, the Iron Curtain descended again as Russia, just to be on the safe side, imposed a blanket ban on all salad imports from EU member states.

As Arthur Lowe sipped his favourite tipple, an Amazon (gin and ginger ale served with a single slice of cucumber) after a day playing Captain Mainwaring in Dad’s Army, never could he have imagined what the future would hold for this embellishment to his drink. Let us hope that a similar fate does not await the glacé cherry.

The cucumber originated in India. It is a member of the gourd family and is therefore related to the squash. A creeping vine, it is a delight to grow as the fruit gradually extends from the remains of a pleasant little yellow flower to amazing proportions far exceeding the most confident gardener’s expectations. It comes in three varieties: slicing, pickling and, for those for whom once it is eaten it keeps coming back, burpless.

The hapless cucumber was temporarily let off the hook this week when German health authorities suspected the culprit to be beansprouts from Lower Saxony, starting another wave of panic as cases of infections and deaths continued to rise.

We were overdue another pandemic scare after swine flu failed to live up to the initial scaremongering that its threat to humankind was far greater than the strain that wiped out millions worldwide in the aftermath of the First World War.

Having suffered two stomach infections from eating factory-farmed and processed salads, I am only two aware that not all is tickety-boo in this realm of the food industry.

Now, to cap this latest in a long line of food scandals, comes a warning from the Society for General Microbiology that terrorists, dissident republicans in Northern Ireland or the loony fringe of animal rights activists could be preparing to contaminate prepared food or drink with poison or harmful bacteria.

The way the processed and intensive food industry is going, they needn’t bother, because unscrupulous producers are doing a job fine without outside help.

If ever there was a case for buying local or growing your own, then this is the alarm call with more bells ringing than when Monty’s victory at El Alamein gave the British nation the first cause for unbridled celebration in the Second World War.

As with all food scares – such as salmonella in eggs, sugar-laced drinks, contaminated cooking oil or mad cow disease – the associated publicity has a positive outcome. Not only does it force producers more intent on profit than ethical farming or following responsible production processes to clean up their act, it also reveals to the public just where the food on their plate comes from and how it gets there.

Like every fan of salads, I like the taste, versatility and health-giving properties of these eclectic plants – but I also find washing and drying such a fiddly thing as a lettuce a tad on the boring side. Also, because getting the same variety as found in a handy bag would mean preparing quite a few, I buy the ready-to-eat convenience bags. Well, not any more.

No sooner were cucumbers being dumped the length and breadth of Europe than up piped the food experts to gaily inform us gullible consumers what exactly goes into pre-packed salads. As with all mass-produced processed food, there is much more than a collection of leaves in those puffed up little bags – and it doesn’t make for happy reading.

If e-coli wasn’t enough to worry about, apparently one in four lettuces grown in the UK is contaminated with chemicals from the pesticides applied when grown under glass or polythene. Then there’s the chlorine used as a disinfectant in the washing process, and then comes the final non-hand touch – ‘modified atmosphere

packing.’ That’s retail gobbledygook for sucking out the oxygen from each bag and pumping it full of carbon dioxide. And pourquoi? To ensure that each see-through bag resembles a neatly puffed pillow. Just what every shopper needs to rest a weary head against on the journey home.

I don’t always find myself in agreement with the French, but as one of their food experts explained on Radio Four’s Food programme a year or so ago, lettuce should be bought within hours of being cut and, of course washed thoroughly, but not drowned so as not to remove the earthiness of a plant at its freshest and best.

I reacquainted myself with not one but two varieties of fresh local lettuce at the weekend to serve as a crisp and flavoursome culinary counterpoint to equally fresh Jersey Royals and home-made fish cakes made with fresh fish.

Whatever or whoever is eventually brought to book for the current e-coli bug, the whole sorry saga should serve as yet another warning that we tamper with nature, the seasons and traditional growing practices at mankind’s peril.