Ikea withdraws meatballs in Europe, 21 nations hit
Associated Press
Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Updated 11:19 am, Monday, February 25, 2013
"Based on the results of our mapping, we can confirm that the contents of the meatballs follow the Ikea recipe and contain only beef and pork from animals raised in the U.S. and Canada," Ikea North America spokeswoman Mona Astra Liss said in a statement. Ikea is known for its assemble-it-yourself furniture but its trademark blue-and-yellow megastores also have cafeteria-style restaurants offering Swedish dishes such as meatballs served with boiled or mashed potatoes, gravy and lingonberry jam. European Union officials met Monday to discuss tougher food labeling rules after the discovery of horse meat in a wide range of frozen supermarket meals that were supposed to contain beef or pork. [...] those foods include meatballs, burgers, kebabs, lasagna, pizza, tortelloni, ravioli, empanadas and meat pies, among other items. Gunnar Dafgard AB, a family-owned frozen foods company in southwestern Sweden that supplies Ikea's meatballs in Europe, posted a brief statement on its website saying "the batch in question has been blocked and we are investigating the situation." Processed food products — a business segment with traditionally low margins that often leads producers to hunt for the cheapest suppliers — often contain ingredients from multiple suppliers in different countries, who themselves at times subcontract production to others, making it hard to monitor every link in the production chain. Standardized DNA checks with meat suppliers or more stringent labeling rules on disclosing the origin of processed food's ingredients will add costs that producers will most likely hand over to consumers, making food more expensive. Reported by SeattlePI.com 2 days ago.
Associated Press
Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Updated 11:19 am, Monday, February 25, 2013
"Based on the results of our mapping, we can confirm that the contents of the meatballs follow the Ikea recipe and contain only beef and pork from animals raised in the U.S. and Canada," Ikea North America spokeswoman Mona Astra Liss said in a statement. Ikea is known for its assemble-it-yourself furniture but its trademark blue-and-yellow megastores also have cafeteria-style restaurants offering Swedish dishes such as meatballs served with boiled or mashed potatoes, gravy and lingonberry jam. European Union officials met Monday to discuss tougher food labeling rules after the discovery of horse meat in a wide range of frozen supermarket meals that were supposed to contain beef or pork. [...] those foods include meatballs, burgers, kebabs, lasagna, pizza, tortelloni, ravioli, empanadas and meat pies, among other items. Gunnar Dafgard AB, a family-owned frozen foods company in southwestern Sweden that supplies Ikea's meatballs in Europe, posted a brief statement on its website saying "the batch in question has been blocked and we are investigating the situation." Processed food products — a business segment with traditionally low margins that often leads producers to hunt for the cheapest suppliers — often contain ingredients from multiple suppliers in different countries, who themselves at times subcontract production to others, making it hard to monitor every link in the production chain. Standardized DNA checks with meat suppliers or more stringent labeling rules on disclosing the origin of processed food's ingredients will add costs that producers will most likely hand over to consumers, making food more expensive. Reported by SeattlePI.com 2 days ago.