By Guest Blogger Tommy Tobin
While golfing at the local links may be a popular pastime for many Americans, consumers don’t expect that golf balls will appear alongside their sausage links on the breakfast plate.
In one of the most unusual food recalls in recent memory, consumers in multiple states are warned that their frozen hash browns may contain golf ball fragments. According to the voluntary recall notice, the potatoes used for these products may have inadvertently been harvested with golf balls.
As hard as the idea may be to swallow, consumption of golf balls or their fragments is not advisable. Golf balls aren’t even a good source of iron as they’re made of resin and rubber. McCain Foods USA warns that consumption of golf ball fragments “may pose a choking hazard or other physical injury to the mouth.”
The affected products were distributed after January 19, 2017 with the production code date B170119. They were sold in two pound bags of Southern Style frozen hash browns under two different labels: Roundy’s and Harris Teeter. The Roundy’s-branded products were shipped to multiple supermarket chains in Illinois and Wisconsin. The Harris Teeter brand “Southern Style” products were shipped to Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, and the District of Columbia.
The recall notice urges consumers in possession of the affected product “not to consume them” and directs consumers to either throw the product away or return it to the store of purchase. No injuries have yet been reported with regard to this recall.
As the Washington Post recently noted, people enjoy hash browns in numerous different ways, with chefs and home cooks each “adding their own special ingredients, although never golf balls.”