Sunday, December 25, 2011

E.coli 0157 Found in Fresh Spinach


Avon Heights Fresh is recalling certain packages of fresh packaged spinach. The brands include Krisp Pak 10oz bags, Better Brand 10oz.bags, and Avon Heights 4-2.51b bags. Yes, here we go with another bagged fresh produce recall.

What happened is that during routine sampling for the commonly occurring bacteria in food, one package of Better Brand 10oz spinach tested positive for E.coli 0157 - a very dangerous bacteria.

The company has decided to be careful and recall all the packages of spinach that were produced at their plant on that particular day. This privately owned company prides itself on the safety of its products, but unfortunately, such problems can happen in spite of safety measures. Here's a quote from their website (www.avonheightsfresh.com):

We pride ourselves on keeping our facilities clean and efficient - food safety is one of the foremost cornerstones of the Avon Heights Fresh brand, and we work hard to make sure that our customers are taking only the healthiest, safest product possible into their kitchens.

All the packages have codes DP 340 and T691 and a "best if used by" date of December 16 - that is, over a week ago. What this means is that most of it has been already eaten. Nothing new there. Unfortunately, food recalls often come too late to do us poor consumers much good.

Don't panic if you think you ate some of the recalled product. It is very unlikely that every package would be contaminated. But if you do get food poisoning symptoms (incubation period is 3-9 days), or, already have them, be sure to tell your doctor about eating this product.

To your good health,

TSF

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