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Bakery, Juice-Maker Hear From FDA

By Dan Flynn and Suzanna Schreck

A bakery with misbranding issues and a juice-maker with sanitation problems have received warning letters from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Minneapolis district office.

Misbranding violations were found at Wisconsin Brother's Bakery Inc., located in Sturtevant, during inspections last September, according to W. Charles Becoat, FDA's Minneapolis district director.

Becoat said the company's Kringle products are misbranded.  "Your firm uses the same label on the packages of all Kringle varieties, and we have determined that your website, www.lehmanns.com, is labeling under section 201 (m) of the Act for your Kringle products because the website address appears on the product labels," Becoat wrote.  "Your product labels and website state that your Kringle products contain butter.  However, our investigator determined that your Kringle products do not contain butter."

FDA's "Warning Letter" to Brother's was dated March 30, 2010.  It was made public Tuesday.  Brother's has 15 working days to respond with details on how the bakery plans to come into compliance.

Also, FDA found Brother's Almond Kringles do not contain "blanched almonds" as indicated on its labels.  The bakery uses margarine, which contains milk, but it fails to disclose that major food allergen on its labels.

Brother's was also cited for failing to properly list certain ingredients on its labels. such as hydrogenated soybean and cottonseed oil.  The bakery also needs to work on its serving size declaration and nutritional information.

Becoat also sent a "Warning Letter" on March 31 to Cut Fruit Express in Inver Grove Heights, MN.  Cut Fruit makes "100% juice" from oranges and grapefruit.

FDA told Cut Fruit that it is operating without a juice Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point plan.

"You must achieve a five-log pathogen reduction through treatments that are applied directly to the juices, or, as with critical juice processors, such as yourself, apply a treatment to fruit surfaces that achieves a 5-log reduction on the surfaces of fruits," Becoats wrote.

Cut Fruit was also warned about keeping food contact surfaces clean, maintaining proper hand washing facilities, and labeling toxic compounds.

Full post as published by Food Safety News on April 14, 2010 (boomark / email).