poke and sniff

A very old way of how the US government checks meat. They would use rods to poke the meat and sniff the rod to see if the meat had bacteria. If the meat smelled bad, then it would be "dirty" and wouldn't pass inspection. This was a pretty bad way to check, cause the inspectors wouldn't wash the rods. That spreads bacteria from the bad meat to the good meat faster than covid ever will. This method was used until around the 1990s.

History teacher: What method did inspectors of meat from the government do during the 1900s?
Student: A rod to poke and sniff the meat for bacteria.