Frozen Organic Premium Blend Vegetable Medley with Shelled Edamame, Organic by Nature…
CRF Frozen Foods, LLC recalled this product and the FDA reported the enforcement action on 27 July 2016 as Class I. The recall was initiated by the firm. Organic Premium Blend Vegetable Medley with Shelled Edamame product is recalled due to a potential for contamination with 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
Frozen Organic Premium Blend Vegetable Medley with Shelled Edamame, Organic by Nature brand, net wt. 5 lb. The UPC is 8 46358 00065 7. Product label bears cooking instructions and listed as: MICROWAVE 1. Pour one quarter contents of bag into a microwave safe dish with 1/4 cup water. 2. Cook covered on HIGH 3 minutes 3. Stir and continue cooking uncovered for 3 to 4 minutes or until heated through* 4. Season to taste and serve. STOVE TOP 1. Pour one quarter contents of bag into saucepan with 1/2 cup water. 2. Heat to a boil over medium -high heat. 3. Stir, reduce heat to simmer and cover. 4. Maintain simmer, stirring occasionally, 10 to 12 minutes or until heated through* 5. Season to taste and serve * For food safety and best product quality cook to a temperature of 160F. Since microwave ovens may vary in power, these instructions are guidelines only. Do not refreeze after thawing.
Reason for recall
Organic Premium Blend Vegetable Medley with Shelled Edamame product is recalled due to a potential for contamination with Listeria monocytogenes.
distributed in AL, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, LA, MD, MA, MI, MN, MO, MT, NV, NH, NJ, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, UT, VT, VA, WA, WV, WI, and in British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan of Canada.
Initiated
22 April 2016
Reported by FDA
27 July 2016
Terminated
8 September 2017
Firm notified by
E-Mail
Product codes
Best By date: 021118
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 is one of 4 records covering the same recall event. The FDA opens one enforcement record per product code, so a recall of a product line appears here many times. Counting these records as 4 separate recalls, which almost every published figure does, overstates it by a factor of 4. Every product code in this event is listed together on the record that covers the whole recall, which is the page a search engine is pointed to for all 4 of them.
The recall ran for 17 months, from 22 April 2016 to termination on 8 September 2017. 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 distribution pattern names 34 states, and the FDA published the enforcement report 3 months after the firm began the recall.
Recalls of a sauce, dip or condiment run a median of 6 months, so this one was longer than usual for its category. Sauces and dips sit at the intersection of the acidified foods rule and the allergen rule: an equilibrium pH above 4.6 turns a shelf-stable product into a botulism risk, and the ingredient list is long enough that an allergen is easy to lose.
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.
Other sauces, dips and condiments 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.
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.
Recall 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.
