If you’re planning on cooking up a package of bacon this Memorial Day weekend, you may want to check the label. Earlier this week, an urgent recall was announced by Smithfield Packaged Meats Corp. for about 185,610 pounds of ready-to-eat (RTE) bacon topping products. Why? It turns out the products might be contaminated with metal.

Bacon; image courtesy of Wokandapix via Pixabay, www.pixabay.com

According to the company, the affected products were shipped to distributors and retailers across the country from February 21, 2022, to February 23, 2022, and March 3, 2022, to March 5, 2022. The specific products in the recall include the following, according to the company:

• 5-lb. packages containing “Golden Crisp PATRICK CUDAHY PRECOOKED BACON TOPPING” SKU 43200 12002 with lot codes 2054, 2062 and 2063.

• 5-lb. packages containing “Smithfield PRECOOKED BACON TOPPING” SKU 43200 12003 with lot codes 2063 and 2064.

• 5-lb. packages containing “Golden Crisp PATRICK CUDAHY FULLY COOKED BACON TOPPING APPLEWOOD SMOKED” SKU 43200 12296 with lot codes 2053 and 2062.

• 5-lb. packages containing “Smithfield FULLY COOKED BACON TOPPING” SKU 43200 12663 with lot code 2064.

• 5-lb. packages containing “MEMBER’S MARK FULLY COOKED BACON CRUMBLES” SKU 78742240923 with “BEST IF USED BY” date of “2022-11-18.”

The issue was first discovered when a customer contacted the company with a report that they “found metal in the RTE bacon topping product.” Fortunately, there have been no confirmed reports of consumers being injured or experiencing adverse reactions after consuming the products. For now, consumers who have the products in their homes should either throw them away or return them for a refund.

Sources:

Bacon recall: 90 tons of bacon topping could be contaminated with metalMassive bacon recall includes 90 tons that need to be thrown out