Local stores pull peanut butter products

From candy and cookies to crackers, ice cream and nutrition bars, dozens of products — including some that appear on local grocery shelves — have been affected by a salmonella outbreak linked to peanut butter.

Stewart’s Shops was particularly concerned about the potential contamination as they commenced a company-wide sale on their half-gallons of ice cream.

Company spokesman Tom Mailey said Peanut Butter Pandemonium is the company’s biggest seller, and many other ice cream flavors contain peanut butter. However, the company’s ice cream ingredient suppliers say their products are salmonella-free, Mailey said.

“We took a very good look, but our suppliers said we’re all good to go,” Mailey said.

However, Stewart’s Shops did pull all Keebler crackers with peanut butter from their shelves last week.

The Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control are investigating a salmonella outbreak that has sickened nearly 500 Americans in 43 states and resulted in six deaths.

The outbreak has been linked to a Peanut Corporation of America manufacturing plant in Georgia. The plant makes peanut butter and peanut paste for many commercially produced products.

There are 18 confirmed cases of peanut butter-related salmonella in New York, according to state Department of Health spokeswoman Beth Goldberg, none in the greater Capital Region. Most of the cases are in the northern and western counties.

The first case in New York was reported Sept. 28 and the latest was Dec. 21, Goldberg said.

The Centers for Disease Control along with state and local health departments are continuing to investigate the outbreak’s association with other brands.

“This is a complicated outbreak because of peanut paste distribution,” Goldberg said. “There are so many products out there.”

Affected products include Keebler cookies and crackers, Little Debbie crackers, Famous Amos cookies, Perry’s ice cream, and ZonePerfect, LUNA, and NutriPals snack bars.

National brands of jarred peanut butter have not been affected.

The outbreak also affects peanut butter products at the Wal-Mart bakery. Wal-Mart said in a statement that the company would not comment on the local level but said it would be pulling from its stores any product that contained peanut butter from Peanut Corporation of America.

Little Debbie products were removed from the shelves Saturday at Gabriel’s grocery store in Scotia, according to manager Tom Lancaster.

At the Niskayuna Co-op, general manager Donald Bisgrove said representatives from Perry’s pulled ice cream products with peanut butter from the shelves.

Bisgrove said this voluntary recall has not been as bad as previous food scares, including the recent recall of Peter Pan peanut butter.

“People were bringing back jars from the cupboard. We had thousands of bottles. That was wild,” he said.

Categories: Schenectady County