Fruitland American Meat of Missouri is recalling about 4,012 pounds of fresh beef products because the dorsal root ganglia may not have been completely removed. That material is considered a risk for BSE, or mad cow disease, and agency regulations state it must be removed in products made from cattle older than 30 months.
The products being recalled are 40 pound cases containing two 20 pound packages of bone-in “Rain Crow Ranch Ribeye” with these production dates: 9/5/13, 9/10/13, 9/11/13, 9/26/13, 10/2/13, 10/3/2013, 11/8/13, 11/22/13, 12/17/13, 12/26/13, 12/27/13,1/16/14, 1/17/14, 1/23/14, 1/31/14, 2/13/14, 2/14/14, 2/21/14, 2/28/14, 3/8/14, 3/20/14, 4/4/14 or 4/25/14. The dates are printed on the box. Also recalled are quartered beef carcasses. All products have the establishment number “EST. 2316” inside the USDA mark of inspection.
The products were produced and packaged on various dates between September 2013 and April 2014. The bone-in ribeye roasts were the source material of concern. The roasts were distributed to a restaurant in New York, NY and a Whole Foods distribution center in Connecticut that services stores in New England. The carcasses were distributed to an FSIS-inspected establishment in Missouri for further processing and distribution, and to a restaurant in Kansas City, Missouri. All of these products would have been processed into smaller cuts with no identifying consumer packaging.
Dorsal root ganglia, which are branches of the nervous system in the vertebra, are specific risk materials for BSE. They may contain the infective prion in cattle that are infected with BSE. These materials are prohibited in human food to minimize potential risk to people. There have been no reports of adverse reactions, but BSE takes a long period of time to manifest symptoms.
