Salmonella in Flour
The parent company of Pillsbury products, Hometown Food Company, made a voluntary recall roughly 12,245 cases of flour. The product lots affected by the recall at 5lb bags for Unbleached All-Purpose Flour with the UPC Item Code 051500-222416. The flour may have been contaminated with Salmonella. Check out the recall statement yourself here: http://www.hometownfoodcompany.com/img/Pillsbury-Flour-Recall.pdf
There have yet to be reported illnesses associated with this recall, but Hometown Food Company is still expressing “an abundance of caution” (Hometown Recall). The company is advising consumers to continue practicing safe food handling practices. Do not treat flour like a ready-to-eat product, for flour is a minimally processed ingredient.
Safe flour handling practices include:
- Using heating processes like baking, frying, or cooking to kill any potential harmful pathogens in the flour
- Cleaning all utensils and surfaces after coming in contact with uncooked flour/batters/doughs
- Washing hands after handling flour
- Avoid eating uncooked doughs, sorry but, this includes cookie doughL
This is not the only flour recall to happen this year. Because Salmonella was discovered during sampling, General Mills also made a voluntary recall on their five-pound bags of Gold Medal Unbleached Flour in January. No illnesses have been reported from the recent Gold Medal recall.
Flour is made from ground-up, sifted wheat. Going through very little processing, wheat is transformed into flour through the processes of cleaning, tempering, and milling. If a kernel of wheat from the field is contaminated with a pathogen like Salmonella prior to milling, there is no guarantee that a whole batch of flour won’t be contaminated.
Here is the link to the FDA’s page announcing the recall of Pillsbury Unbleached All-Purpose 5lb Flour https://www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/ucm633320.htm
For more information about food safety, food poisoning, or to speak to a food poisoning lawyer.
