The Maine Department of Agriculture announced that Bubier Meats is recalling meat products for potential E. coli O157:H7 contamination. Products subject to the recall are:
- 2 whole sides of beef carcasses-736 lbs stamped “Est. 4”
- 45 plastic cryovac bags @ 10 lbs-450 lbs of beef labeled Bubier Meats “Hamburg”
- 30 plastic cryovac bags @ 10 lbs-300 lbs of ground beef labeled “Caldwell Farms Beef All Natural Beef”
- * 450 lbs of beef primal cuts labeled “Caldwell Farms Beef All Natural Beef”
Plant officials said the recall was related not to E. coli contamination, but to paperwork issues. However, the Knox County Times reports that Hal Prince, director of the Department of Agriculture’s division of Quality Assurance and Regulation, said that while paperwork is one concern, an inspector found contamination.
“In doing a preprocessing inspection, the inspector found fecal contamination on equipment,” said Prince.”Half of the suspect product was still in the freezer, but half had been shipped already so we sought the recall as a matter of safety.”