Bob Evans Farms Recalling Over 7,500 Pounds Of Italian Pork Sausage

Have you ever sausage a recall? Bob Evans Farms Foods, Inc., is pulling a lot of pork. More specifically, the company is recalling approximately 7,560 pounds of Italian pork sausage products due to some health concerns, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announcement. The link to health concerns is that some of these sausage may have been contaminated with thin blue rubber. Now, while a lot of ingredients may go into sausage, thin blue rubber frankly isn’t supposed to be one of them.

Bob Evans Farms Foods, Inc., notified the USDA FSIS about the issue after consumers had complained about finding this extraneous material in their sausages. It’s not clear how many sausages may have actually been affected by this contamination. So rather than ask each and every customer, “can I take a look at your sausage,” the company decided to recall all of the possibly affected Italian pork sausage produced on September 8, 2022.

Therefore, if you do have some sausage, check your package. Determine whether it includes one-pound chubs labelled “Bob Evans Italian Sausage” bearing the lot code “XEN3663466” along with a “USE/FRZ BY” date of 11/26/22 and a time stamp between 14:43 and 15:25. There’s also an establishment number “EST. 6785” inside the USDA mark of inspection. The USDA included a photo of such a label that you can use to cross check. Registered dietitian Sandra Frank, EdD, RDN, FAND, also tweeted out this sausage package label photo:

If you didn’t prepare your sausage yourself, you may want to grill the chef about the origin of the sausage.

This certainly is far from the “wurst” situation that you can imagine. While you shouldn’t start sprinkling rubber on your food like it was salt-and-pepper, a one-time accidental ingestion of small amounts of thin blue rubber, depending the type and shape of the rubber, could simply pass through your system. It could be just a matter of just two through days before poop there is. According to the USDA FSIS, there haven’t been any confirmed reports of injury or illness due to ingestion of these particular sausage products so far. Therefore, at this point, the recall is mainly for precautionary reasons. It’s always better to prevent any ill effects rather than have to “ketchup” and deal with them.

Naturally, if you do have any of the products affected by the recall, don’t just put these products in the “porking lot” and ignore them. Instead, discard them or return them for refund. And if you’ve already eaten any of the products and feel ill (especially beyond the “maybe-I-shouldn’t-have-eaten-50-of-those-sausages-in-one-sitting” feeling), call your doctor as soon as possible.

This isn’t the first time that Bob Evans Farms, Inc., has had such a recall. Back in January of 2021, the company recalled around 4,200 pounds of Italian pork sausage for the same reason: contamination with thin blue rubber. A sausage-Frank-Twitter post at the time included a link to the USDA FSIS announcement:

All of this is a reminder to pay attention to what’s in your food. Pay attention to any USDA FSIS announcement that may emerge. But don’t wait for a recall to happen. Be proactive about food safety. Inspect all of your ingredients before cooking or otherwise preparing them. Make sure there isn’t any rubber on your sausage or anything else that doesn’t belong there. And while eating, it’s not a great idea to keep your eyes closed. Doing so wouldn’t allow you to see what’s actually in your food and can also lead to accidentally-poked-myself-in-the-eye-or-pushed-the-sausage-up-my-nose situations.