If the video embedded above is not viewable, you can see it at these other fine video sharing sites: YouTube, Viddler and Metacafe.

Shamrocks and Shenanigans! It’s a St. Paddy’s Day episode of Cereal Wednesday co-starring NYCWD and Poppy!

Today your fearless Cereal Avengers taste test Chocolate Lucky Charms with swirled marshmallow charms. This General Mills cereal is corn based, unlike its original Lucky Charms counterpart which is oat based. Strangely enough, Chocolate Lucky Charms manages to taste just like the rice-based Cocoa Krispies. It has the same fun shapes of regular Lucky Charms, with a few swirly marshmallows added to the mix.

Since General Mills does it best, here’s their nutrition information for Chocolate Lucky Charms:

Highlights on the box include the good source of Calcium and Vitamin D and the Whole Grain Guarantee of 8g or more per serving of whole grain as recommended by the Whole Grains Council.

While Watchdog said this cereal tastes great, Poppy said this cereal was just a copycat that wasn’t even able to make its milk taste good. A wildly different opinion from your favorite cereal eaters? Shamrocks and shenanigans, say it isn’t so! (Nah, kidding, it’s totally so.)

Taste: Just like Cocoa Krispies…
Box opening: Easy
Bag rippage: A tiny bit, because it was tough to open.
Bag slippage: Totally felt out of the box!
Sog factor: From crunchy to perfect in 2 minutes
Allergy alert: No allergans!
Meat alert: Contains gelatin, a meat based product

Watchdog’s Cereal Wednesday Bowls:


Poppy’s Cereal Wednesday Bowls:

For more information about the cereal please visit the General Mills website.

Erin go bragh! (That’s Irish for “Have a good one!”;)

If the video embedded above is not viewable, you can see it at these other fine video sharing sites: YouTube, Viddler and Metacafe.

Hey, kids! It’s Cereal Wednesday!

Today let’s talk about Cap’n Crunch Crunch Berries by Quaker. This corn and oat based cereal is a spinoff of the original Cap’n Crunch cereal, which includes strawberry sweetened shapes referred to as Crunch Berries. Usually the Crunch Berries are roundly shaped and come in vibrant colors (although originally Crunch Berries were only in a vibrant pink variety). This box being reviewed today, which we actually purchased a few months ago, happened to have limited time only sea animal shapes in promotion of a Sea World vacation giveaway (oops).

Back to the cereal: It tastes pretty phenomenal if you enjoy a super nugget of corn goodness. It still cuts the roof of your mouth just like regular Cap’n Crunch until it gets a chance to sog out a bit then it’s a perfect soggy exterior with a crunchy center.

And now, the nutrition information. Quaker says it best, so let’s have them present the nutrition facts:

Crunch Berries is on the healthy lifestyle list of PepsiCo’s Smart Choices Made Easy. Strange but true.

Taste: Super sweet corn
Box opening: Easy
Bag rippage: A tiny bit, because it was tough to open.
Bag slippage: None!
Sog factor: From razor blades to tolerable crunchiness
Allergy alert: Contains soy

Cereal Wednesday Bowls:

For more information about the cereal please visit the Quaker website.

If the video embedded above is not viewable, you can see it at these other fine video sharing sites: YouTube, Viddler and Metacafe.

Welcome to this bad hair day, just rolled out of bed-looking, Marbits edition of CEREAL WEDNESDAY! *cheer* In this week’s episode I, Poppy, share my most favorite childhood snack with you: hot buttered Cheerios!

We’ve covered this General Mills cereal in its breakfast form before, but here’s a refresher: All by their lonesome Cheerios is a heart healthy cereal with three grams of soluble fiber per 28 gram serving. Also packed into that cup of goodness is 100 calories, 3 grams of protein, lots of vitamins and minerals, as well as whole grain oats and oat fiber.

Then the Cheerios are brought to that upper echelon of deliciousness with a tablespoon of butter! In that serving of Land O Lakes there are 100 calories, 11 grams of fat, and 30 milligrams of cholesterol.

Yes, this version of Cheerios is very bad for you because of the butter. But it’s a fun, savory snack food!! And all the good for you stuff is still in there somewhere… just coated with a little bit of artery hardener.

And now, the recipe:

1 cup Cheerios
1 Tablespoon butter

Place Cheerios in a microwave-safe bowl. Place butter in solid form on top of Cheerios. Place bowl in microwave and heat on high for 45 to 60 seconds. Remove bowl, stir Cheerios-butter mixture. EAT! Preferably hot.

I know you’ll love this tasty treat as much as I do, unless you have some strange aversion to awesome goodness.

Cereal Wednesday Bowls:

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

6

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

6

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

6

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

6

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

6

Jack Guzewich, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Food Defense, Communication, and Emergency Response, at the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

Have you noticed a difference in our website here at the FDA?  During the current Salmonella outbreak, our website has been warning consumers to avoid certain peanuts and peanut products that are affected by the outbreak – but that’s nothing new; we’ve always let consumers know about potentially contaminated foods that could harm them. 

What’s new is that our website has made it easier for you to find out if peanuts or peanut products you’ve bought, or want to buy, have been recalled.  Besides the list of recalled products we usually post, we now offer a searchable database of the recalled products, available at www.fda.gov/salmonella.  Enter the name of the product you want to find out about, and the database will show you if it’s among those that have been recalled.

For example, if you enter a brand name in the search box, recalled products carrying that brand name will pop up.  You can search the database in several ways, including by:

• brand name or
• the UPC code that appears on the product or
• a description of the product or
• any combination of the above.

Another Easy Option

If you just want to do it the old-fashioned way and look over our website’s traditional list of peanuts and peanut products that have been recalled, instead of searching the database, we’ve tried to make things easier for you, too.  The items in the traditional list are divided into categories with easy-to-read headings; for example, cakes, ice cream, peanut butter, pet food, etc., and you can browse over the list or look through it to find a specific product or brand.

It bears repeating:   If either of these options on our website shows you that a product you’ve bought has been recalled, that means you should throw it out in a manner that keeps it out of reach of other people and of pets.  Please wash your hands with hot, soapy water after you’ve discarded the product.

If you know people who don’t have computers, let them know they can still find out if a product is on the recall list.  They can make a free phone call to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 24-hour phone line, at 1-800-CDC-INFO (or 1-800-232-4636).  A representative will help them find out what they want to know.

Sign Up for Automatic E-mail Notices of Recalls

Did you know that you can sign up with FDA to have recall notices automatically sent to you by e-mail?  FDA will send you companies’ announcements that they’re recalling a specific product or products, whether or not the products have been linked to an outbreak.

Free Widget Available

If you have your own blog or website, you might want to put our new widget on it.  It’s a searchable list of recalled peanut products that you can plug onto your site and that FDA will routinely update for you.  The updates will automatically show up on the widget, on your blog or website, so your readers will have the latest information. 

What Product Labels Won’t Tell You

I want to turn my attention to a related, but different, topic.  I want to make sure consumers understand that the name of the company we found to be the source of the Salmonella contamination – Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) – will not appear on the labels of most of the potentially contaminated peanuts and peanut products involved in this outbreak.

 In other words, you can’t just go into a grocery store, look at the label of a food containing peanuts or peanut products, and assume that it’s not being recalled if it doesn’t say “Peanut Corporation of America” somewhere on the label. 

The reason for this is that PCA sold peanuts and peanut products primarily to other manufacturers to use as ingredients in other foods, and those other foods carry the manufacturer’s label, not PCA’s name.  For example, if PCA sold peanut paste to another company for use in making crackers or cookies, the labels on those crackers or cookies would have the company's name – not PCA's name – on them. 

The good news is that the searchable database and recall list on the FDA website include these kinds of products.  That makes it even more important for you to check either the database or the list often, as more products may be added to them.

…And Check Company Websites

If you have a product that contains peanuts in your home, or you plan to buy one, it’s a good idea to check the website of the company that made the product – even if it doesn’t appear on FDA’s searchable database or recall list.  Companies issue recalls voluntarily.  In case they haven't yet provided their recall information to the FDA, for example, it's best to visit company websites as a final safety check to look for information about peanuts and peanut products you plan to eat or buy.  Please be aware, however, that FDA has not verified all information that may be on these websites.

The company website also may tell you if the company’s peanut products don't contain ingredients purchased from PCA.  For example, companies that make the major national brands of peanut butter sold in jars in grocery stores have told FDA that they don't buy ingredients from PCA.  These brands are not associated with the outbreak.

Access to Information Is a Key to Prevention

Recalled peanuts and peanut products made by PCA were used as ingredients in many different kinds of foods, resulting in a large number of recalls by other firms.  Protecting your health is our goal at FDA, and making it easy for you to find out what products have been recalled during this outbreak is helping us to prevent more illnesses.

Go to Source

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The events of the past several weeks have provided us all with a stark reminder of how important it is to have a safe and dependable food supply. As consumers, we expect the food we serve our families to be safe and subject to a system of oversight that is up to the task of protecting our families.

I’m alarmed by the allegations that a domestic peanut butter manufacturer knowingly entered tainted peanut butter into the stream of commerce and provided contaminated product to school feeding programs. Americans need to have absolute trust in the safety of their food supply. The corporate irresponsibility and regulatory failure we have observed in recent weeks as the peanut butter recall expanded, warrants an in-depth review of how our current food safety system operates and what we can do to improve it and provide consumers with the safeguards Americans expect.

Despite the hard work of many at the Department of Agriculture and Food and Drug Administration, more than 325,000 Americans are hospitalized each year because of food borne illness. It’s time that we establish standards that will prevent food borne illness, reform the way that we inspect and test the safety of food, and take steps to create a modern, unified food safety agency capable of reducing the risk of food borne illness. I have directed our team at USDA to begin the process of putting together a framework for improving USDA’s food safety system, and I look forward to working with other Administration officials to pursue broader, structural reform of our food safety system.

Although peanut butter is not one of the products regulated by USDA, the Department of Agriculture has participated in this current recall and has significant responsibilities for preventing and responding to outbreaks of food borne illness.

For instance, the USDA’s Farm Service Agency procures commodity products for USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service’s domestic feeding and nutrition programs. Together they are working to ensure that products manufactured within the expanded recall dating back to January 2007, are not being used in any FNS domestic feeding program. On February 5, as a result of the Salmonella outbreak and subsequent investigation, USDA suspended and proposed to debar the Peanut Corporation of America from doing business with USDA feeding programs, including the school lunch program and food banks.

We will demand that our children’s food choices not only be nutritious and wholesome, but also safe.

The USDA plays a critical role in ensuring public health and safety through its inspection program and requirement that countries that export meat and poultry to the United States meet standards equivalent to those applied to domestic facilities.

Our first line of defense in protecting the food supply is the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service inspection personnel. The Food Safety and Inspection Service has nearly 7,800 inspectors working in about 6,200 meat, poultry and processed egg plants every day of operation to ensure the safety of the food supply. For FSIS-regulated plants, we require each facility to have a risk management and mitigation plan in place and we collect microbiological samples and conduct visual inspections to ensure each facility’s food safety plan is working. As part of our overall inspection program, FSIS inspectors verify food safety systems and as party of their comprehensive system, personnel collect product samples for foodborne pathogens including E. coli O157:H7, Listeria and Salmonella.

There are a lot of successes here at the USDA, but as I have said we can always do better. The time is right to modernize the food safety system.

We understand that consumers have a lot of questions, and we are proud to offer a diverse collection of educational and informational resources for all audiences, including Podcasts, SignFSIS video-casts in American Sign Language, the virtual representative Karen who is available 24/7 to answer any food safety question, or our food safety experts staffing the USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline. 

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