Ate raw beef, help?

[Beth1408]

So I went to a fancy italian restaurant last night and ordered a Carpaccio starter. I had no idea that it was raw beef until afterwards.

I'm 21+3 with a little boy and I feel like such an idiot. I'm really worried now that I could have done him some harm😞. It's bank a holiday so obviously I can't call my GP for advice either.

The risk of Listeria is incredibly, incredibly low. Some people don’t even stop eating rare meat so I really wouldn’t worry!

I'm sure it's fine...it's meant to be eaten raw and it's at a restaurant, so not like it was sitting out at all before you ate it.

In Japan they continue to eat sushi through pregnancy...every country has their own food rules. For example in Australia you're not meant to eat hummus or lunch meat.

And you can be extremely unlucky and get listeria from a bag of salad...honestly you can't cancel out all risks, please don't worry.

Didn't you realise when you saw it? What did you think it was when it was served ?

How can you order something and you don't know what it is, have it arrive looking raw and eat it ?

I'm sure it's fine. A tartare might be more of an issue as its chopped about but carpaccio should find

Try not to stress. The risk is really low, especially from a one off, and your baby is way more likely to be OK than harmed by it.

I accidentally ate a couple of swordfish steaks in my first pregnancy and spent several weeks stressing about it. My son is 3.5 years old and absolutely fine.

Just to flag the risk of raw meat is not so much listeria/food poisoning as it is toxoplasmosis (which is a small parasite found in food and also the same reason you shouldn't deal with cat litter).

It is usually harmless in adults and I think once you have it you are immune to the effects afterwards. So the chances of it being in your food are small and even so there is a chance that you already had it (in France they routinely test for it at the start of pregnancy and if you are immune I think you're safe to eat rare steak after). So the risk is really just if you haven't had it before ... if you're really worried I think you can take a test to see if you are immune and if not there are drugs available in the small chance you have been infected.

Try not to stress though... the risk is probably very small but you can always chat to your GP tomorrow if you are still worried.

It’s fine. I still have my beef rare at 24 weeks. Such a minuscule risk.

I’m confused as to how you didn’t know what you were eating though, surely you can see it?

Thank you everybody for your replies, I feel a bit better about it now❤...
To answer peoples questions I did think it looked a bit odd, but I wasn't aware that people ate raw beef, let alone served it in a restaurant!
I thought it tasted fine so didn't think anything of it🤷‍♀️. Lesson learned, it won't be happening again. I think I might just request a blood test for my own peace of mind, but hopefully everything will be fine.

It’s done now so there’s nothing you can really do but try not worry about it as the risk of contracting toxoplasmosis is quite low if you are used to eating undercooked meats like medium rare steaks.