I agree with MacDoctor – this is absolutely extraordinary.
I am horrified that the frozen vegetable maker, Talley’s, is taking such a lackadaisical attitude to the contamination of packets of frozen peas. Up to 50% of their peas have been found to be black nightshade – a fairly poisonous berry. Have they ordered a recall? No. Have they shut down the line and checked their product? Apparently not. And the response of the New Zealand Food Safety Authority is “to give them a call”. A kick in the backside would seem more appropriate.
… Talley’s has these contaminated packets out in the community and all they can offer is a vague promise of a “review of its processes”. Their first complaint was six months ago and they are offering this wishy-washy garbage this week. …
It is perfectly possible some unsuspecting mother is mashing peas for her infant right now, not realising she is about to kill her child. If that is not motivation enough for Talley’s to recall it’s product and fix its systems, I don’t know what is.
…
MacDoctor’s advice to all is to stop buying Tally’s products immediately, throw out the stuff you have in your freezer and re-purchase a safer brand. If you are using any of their pea-containing products, under no circumstances give it to your children. Do not buy Talley’s products again until Talley’s:
- Informs the public where the problem was and how they fixed it.
- Apologies for it’s lackadaisical attitude.
He calls this a boycott.
Screw a boycott. When you boycott something, it’s to make a point that you will refuse something that will normally benefit yourself for the sake of a principle.
Frankly, not purchasing poison masquerading as healthy vegetables is common sense, as it refusing to purchase food from a company that doesn’t seem to care about the difference.
Ok, I’m going to stop now because this really, really makes me angry. Talley’s deserve to be driven out of business, and if this thing goes the way it should, that’s exactly what’s going to happen.
Something should go here, maybe later. 
Scrubone: Thanks for the link. I am advocating a boycott of ALL of Talley’s products until the matter is cleared, not just their peas (as you point out, it’s not a boycott to avoid poison!). Talley’s needs to be taught a sharp lesson in consumer power. I don’t want to drive them out of business – there are a lot of jobs at stake here – but there are definitely some managerial heads that need to roll.
Surely, we can convince them to outsource to San Lu, China.
The penalties there might provide more incentive.
This is a complex issue, as it is not only Talley’s at fault, but an individual farmer.
First, black nightshade was allowed by the farmer to grow profusely in a pea crop.
The farmer or Talleys (whoever makes the final decision – the crops are grown on contract) then chose to harvest the crop anyway, despite the infestation. The berries passed through the machinery and ended up with the peas – as both the farmer and Talleys should have known they would. Anything that size and weight will do so, californian thistle heads can do the same thing.
Talleys then missed the contamination during processing, packaged the product and allowed it to be sold.
So there are two parties at fault. Whose fault is greater? That is questionable.
It may not be Talleys management at fault directly – rather the individuals inspecting the peas for contamination, and the individual farmer and harvest workers. The solution may be to simply provide greater training to floor staff to identify contamination, or provide more staff if the current workload is too high and product is not inspected correctly – and more importantly, ensure heavily contaminated crops are not harvested in the first place.
Management will have allowed that situation to develop, and must now correct it, but I don’t know that “rolling” some “managerial heads” will really help – you may just get rid of the people best qualified to fix the problem.