Green Cedar Ackawi cheese in small clear plastic shrink wrapped packaging bearing a sell…
Harb Dairy, Inc. DBA Green Cedar Dairy recalled this product and the FDA reported the enforcement action on 12 December 2018 as Class I. The recall was initiated by the firm. Harb Dairy dba Green Cedar Dairy initiated a voluntary recall of Ackawi cheese following notification by U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development that the product was positive for Listeria monocytogenes.
The record
Every field below is published by the FDA in the openFDA food enforcement database. Check the FDA notice before acting on any recall: this page is a reading of the public record, not a substitute for it.
- Product
- Green Cedar Ackawi cheese in small clear plastic shrink wrapped packaging bearing a sell by date of March 26, 2019 or later. The sell by date is on a white sticker on the back of the product. , Keep Refrigerated
- Reason for recall
- Harb Dairy dba Green Cedar Dairy initiated a voluntary recall of Ackawi cheese following notification by U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development that the product was positive for Listeria monocytogenes.
- Recalling firm
- Harb Dairy, Inc. DBA Green Cedar Dairy
- Firm location
- Dearborn, Michigan, United States
- Classification
- Class I
- Status
- Terminated
- Recall number
- F-0751-2019
- Quantity
- N/A
- Distribution
- Michigan only
- Initiated
- 14 November 2018
- Reported by FDA
- 12 December 2018
- Terminated
- 20 May 2019
- Firm notified by
- Two or more of the following: Email, Fax, Letter, Press Release, Telephone, Visit
- Product codes
- Green Cedar Ackawi cheese in small clear plastic shrink wrapped packaging bearing a sell by date of March 26, 2019 or later. The sell by date is on a white sticker on the back of the product.
Reading this record
Five things about this record are not in the record itself, and each one changes how it should be read.
- Class I means the FDA judged a reasonable probability that the product would cause serious health consequences or death. The class is assigned by an agency health hazard evaluation under 21 CFR 7.41, not by the firm.
- The firm started this recall itself. Most FDA food recalls are voluntary, and a recall is a food safety plan working rather than failing. The circumstances in which the agency asks for one instead are set out in 21 CFR 7.45.
- This record is the only one the FDA opened for its recall event, so it covers a single product code.
- The recall ran for 6 months, from 14 November 2018 to termination on 20 May 2019. Termination means the agency judged that all reasonable effort had been made, under 21 CFR 7.55, and it says nothing about whether product remained in circulation.
- The FDA published the enforcement report 4 weeks after the firm began the recall.
- Recalls of cheese run a median of 7 months, so this one was about typical for its category. Cheese dominates Listeria recalls among dairy products because soft and semi-soft varieties hold enough moisture for the organism to grow at refrigeration temperature, and because most are eaten without any further cooking step.
What this recall was for
Listeria monocytogenes
Listeria monocytogenes is a bacterium that grows at refrigeration temperature, which is why it dominates recalls of ready-to-eat foods that are never cooked again before they are eaten.
A preventive controls plan covers Listeria contamination under the clauses below. This is where the control belongs, not a finding against any firm named on this page: a recall record states a reason, and most of these recalls were initiated by the firm itself.
- 21 CFR 117.135(c)(3)
- Sanitation controls: the controls on cleaning food-contact surfaces and on preventing cross-contact and cross-contamination from insanitary objects, people and equipment.
- 21 CFR 117.165(a)(3)
- Environmental monitoring: testing the processing environment for an environmental pathogen, required when a ready-to-eat food is exposed to the environment before packaging.
- 21 CFR 117.150
- Corrective actions: what a facility does when a preventive control was not properly implemented, including identifying and correcting the problem and evaluating the food for safety.
Filed under cheese. A product can sit in more than one.
Other cheese recalls for the same reason
These are the closest records in the corpus: the same kind of food, recalled for a hazard this record also names. Unlike the firm’s own records below, they come from different companies, which is what makes them a pattern rather than a history.
All 2018 recalls · All FDA food recall data
21 CFR 117.135(c)(3) is the clause behind this recall, and it is one somebody has to produce evidence for at their next audit. Krolda maps supplier documents to the clause they satisfy in FSSC 22000, IFS Food and 21 CFR 117, and routes the corrective action when the evidence is missing.
Early accessRecall records come from the openFDA food enforcement API, published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the public domain. Krolda adds the hazard classification and the clause mapping; neither is an FDA determination. Always check the FDA notice before acting on a recall.