After complaints from a few consumers over minor oral injuries, Tyson Foods, Inc. (NYSE:TSN) has decided to recall 75,000 pounds of chicken nuggets that were packaged into two separate products.
Tyson Foods: A mouthful of plastic
The chicken nugget recall, announced last week by Missouri-based Tyson Foods, Inc. (NYSE:TSN) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), involves two foodstuffs(?): five pound bags of “Tyson Fully Cooked White Meat Chicken Nuggets” with “Best if Used By” dates of either Jan. 26, 2015 or Feb. 26, 2015; and 20-pound bags of “Spare Time Fully Cooked Nugget-Shaped Chicken Breast Pattie Fritters w/Rib Meat” (with no “Best by” date specified).
The latter being such a mouthful of horrible it’s hardly surprising that no “Best by” date is necessary. You can almost see Ron Burgandy using the full title of that deplorable bite as a vocal warmup in Anchorman 3.
According to the USDA, the five pound bags were distributed to Sam’s Club locations nationwide, and the 20-pound bags were shipped for “institutional use in Indiana and Arkansas.”
To paraphrase Otto Van Bismark, “For those that enjoy eating sausages or chicken nuggets and obey the law, you should not watch either being made.” This point was made more appropriate when you look at how plastic got into the “food” in the first place.
According to Tyson Foods, Inc. (NYSE:TSN), the problem was traced back to a product scraper inside a blending machine at one of the company’s 40 production facilities.
The plastic came from where?
What the hell is a product scraper and why should something as wholesome as a chicken breast require a blending machine?
The USDA considers this a “Class III” recall, which means the associated health risk is low and discontinuing use of the product is not recommended. I understand that the USDA is not in the business of telling consumers what to eat…but…I’ll do it.
Don’t eat this product no matter what “Best by” date it has. Buy a little chick, feed it, love it, kill it, and eat it. Throughout this process you shouldn’t have any call for a product scraper in a blending machine.
