It's only a very few with specific UPCs and best-by dates, and most of them, according to the company, have not hit stores yet.
quote:A limited amount of three varieties of Aunt Jemima Pancake and Waffle Mix: Original, Original Complete, and Buttermilk Complete are being recalled due to potential salmonella contamination. There is a health risk only if consumed raw or if product is undercooked. Salmonella bacteria is killed at a temperature of 160 degrees Fahrenheit.
quote:How do I know if I have this product?
The products are packaged in 2 pound and 5 pound boxes with any of the following 10-digit UPC's (located on the bottom of the box) 30000 43272, 30000 05040, 30000 05070, 30000 05300.
with Best Before Dates (located on the top flap of the box) Feb 08 09 through Feb 16 09.
Please note the affected product must have a combination of the Best Before Date above and UPC to be affected product.
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People don't always thoroughly cook pancakes, though. I know my husband sometimes gets them a bit raw in the middle before he gets the hang of a batch; I don't make him recook them if they're from a mix because there shouldn't be any risk from a mix.
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Griddle me this, Batterman! What's black, gray, and red and flatter than a pancake? You after I drop this ten thousand pound weight on you!
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Blanket this thread all you want with puns! Pour them on thick and rich! We won't give you any flap, Jack!
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How do they get salmonella in a powder mix? Maybe from the egg before it is powdered?
Maybe we could just zap the pancake mix box with a microwave for a few seconds as soon as we bring it home from the store. (Unless there is tinfoil in the packaging.) How long does it take for microwaves to kill salmonella, or any other such organism?
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I was wondering the same thing actually. I didn't realize that you could get salmonella in a powder mix.
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Ron, I've heard 20 seconds. This from the man who teaches the food handler's classes at the health department. That was what he suggested to kill bacteria in your sponges.
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quote:Originally posted by andi330: I was wondering the same thing actually. I didn't realize that you could get salmonella in a powder mix.
I kinda wondered that too. If it sat long enough on the shelves wouldn't it die? Or is there excess humidity trapped in there or something? *totally ignorant of the conditions salmonella can survive, other than that washing with soap and water gets it off your hands effectively enough, cooking to 160 is fatal, and it's good practice to clean surfaces it could have been in contact with with bleach*
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Perhaps in a dry environment they turn into a cyst form, where they can survive in suspended animation for years.
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Ya know what's annoying? Last week is the first time in years that I've had a "complete pancake mix" in my home. And yep, it's AuntJemima. At least it's from a safe batch.
"I didn't realize that you could get salmonella in a powder mix." "If it sat long enough on the shelves wouldn't it die?"
Nah, bacteria can slow down their respiration/living rate tremendously when conditions are unfavorable. And when the environment turns too hot or too cold or too dry or too acidic or too etc for survival, many bacteria can encyst themselves to hibernate (closer to suspended animation) until conditions are favorable for growth. ie They'll play dead until you add water or defrost or etc, then come fully alive. Some will then reproduce extremely rapidly, almost as if they're trying to make up for lost time.
In order to have powdered eggs retain the type of binding qualities as regular uncooked eggs, they can't be heated to temperatures that cause the protein molecules to denature: ie permantly change their shapes into forms that can't be readily returned to their biologically active form. And the only way to kill the hardier bacteria is by denaturing their proteins (or use toxins that ain't gonna be healthy for people to consume).
To get around that problem, the eggs are randomly sampled&tested at the chicken farms then at the factory upon delivery to make sure no harmful bacteria are present. Then those eggs proven to be safe* are batch processed through sterilized machinery in sterile work areas where they are dried and packaged into sterilized industrial-size containers.
Samples of each batch have been saved for testing, with one part being tested nearly immediately (testing itself takes time) and other parts saved for future testing. THEN the containers filled with batches proven to be safe* are sold to manufacturers of products that use powdered eggs, who do their own testing.
Same with all of the other ingredients that go into making their finished products. So it doesn't have to have been the powdered eggs which were contaminated. It could have been another ingredient.
Then the ingredients are sample*tested by the manufacture for safety before being mixed together into batches of the final product. Then samples from each batch of final product is tested for safety, some immediately and some saved for future testing.
Now demand for finished products ebbs and flows, sometimes high and sometimes low. At the industrial scale, wanna keep the machinery running at a constant pace and keep people working steadily. Anything off of that constancy drives costs up. So manufacturers keep their production lines running to fill the average demand, and warehouse** their excess during lulls in demand until demand peaks again.
Sometimes the demand peaks are sufficiently high that the manufacturer runs out of inventory and are shipping directly from the production line. Then one of the samples-to-be-tested-later is tested, and found to be unsafe. Or a worker in one of the clean-rooms is diagnosed a few days after shipment as suffering from food-poisoning; ie contaminated with unsafe bacteria that might have been transferred to a batch. Or a clean-room itself might have been found to be contaminated during a regular inspection. Or several consumers could have gotten food-poisoning, and the only known common food eaten by all of them is the manufacturer's product.
Then the manufacturer goes into full panic mode, and recalls everything that has even a remote chance of being contaminated. It takes years and years and years to build up a good product reputation, and only a few days of bad publicity concerning the safety of their product to kill demand. And that bad publicity can cause people to wonder about their other products. Plus the manufacturer has to worry about the inevitable lawsuits should it appear that the manufacturer was aware of a health-safety defect, then failed to make the maximum effort to recall an unsafe product.
I find myself wondering whether this is yet another case an intermediary of good repute buying processed ingredients from China, then selling those ingredients to a longtime customer without telling the customer of the change in suppliers. Chinese manufacturers do have a reputation for underbidding other suppliers to win contracts from intermediate wholesellers. And do have a reputation of making their production-cost savings (and thus their profit) from poor product-safety control. Cuz normally when a product is recalled, at least the general area where and/or the probable reason how the safety foul-up occurred is announced along with the recall. Except China has a reputation for excessively heavy trade retaliation, even when they know that one of their manufacturers screwed up BigTime even by Chinese law.
* ie Statisticly-proven to be HIGHLY unlikely to be contaminated. ** Which is where the discount stores make their profit and where regular stores obtain their sales specials: STEEP discount buying from manufacturers who have too much product to warehouse. It's either sell that excess at extreme markdown, or pay someone to haul it away as garbage.
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Speaking of which, the International House of Pancakes... "...IHOP...has added four new items to its menu...including Who-Cakes and green eggs and ham..."
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