Yet Another Food Recall

This one involves the removal of more than 100 tainted products from Castleberry's Food Co. Some of the products wound up in Key West grocery stores and were removed.

This latest recall really makes you think about what we are eating, not to mention who's minding the food inspection store. It certainly doesn't appear to be the Food and Drug Administration these days.

See the list of tainted foods here. According to the Company's July 21 press release, the original recall that was "announced on July 18 included 10 products" but was expanded on July 21. There is more information on the main page of the Company's website about the "Great Value Chili products included in this recall" according to the Company's website. Check it out here.

Stop Fish Swaps

"Florida's fishermen have built a reputation for harvesting quality seafood. We do not want unscrupulous merchants to tarnish that hard-earned image." That from Charles H. Bronson, Florida's Agriculture Commissioner. Mislabeling or misrepresenting fish is a national problem and a fraud on consumers. Under Florida law the practice is also unlawful.

Among the abuses is the substitution of other fish (often catfish) for grouper. Restaurants that substitute one kind of fish for another and don't inform consumers will now face increased fines of from $250 to $500 from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, which is required to inspect Florida restaurants twice each year. This seems like just a drop in the bucket to us, but for good restaurants, their reputation is their business, and being charged with a violation, even without a fine, would likely be a deterrent enough. What concerns us is the restaurant owner who just doesn't care. For that kind of owner a $250 to $500 fine will be thought of as just the cost of doing business.

Now Florida has created a website to help consumers combat -- and report -- mislabeled seafood. The website also contains information about the seafood industry, seafood festivals, seafood recipes, seafood cooking tips arranged by species, and interesting links to other seafood related sites. We've added a link, called "Florida Seafood," so you can check it out. Let us know what you think.

Don't Look In The Freezer

If you're a dinner guest, don't look in your host's freezer. You never know what you may find. On Tuesday, July 3rd in Verviers, Belgium, a city 78 miles east of Brussels, a dinner guest did just that.

After dinner, she volunteered to help with the dishes. When she was done she decided to put the leftovers in the freezer in the basement. She went down, opened the freezer door and found two bodies: one of the hosts wife and the other of his 12 year old stepson.

The other guests notified police who identified the bodies. The host admitted that he and his wife, who had been stabbed and placed on ice for several weeks, had had a bit of a quarrel, but he could not explain the death of the child.

Sounds like a plot line for a budding KW novelist, doesn't it? They say truth is stranger than fiction.

It's A Cat; It's A Rac; It's Ticket!

"We've been put on this planet and made caretaker of the planet, of the creatures here and of one another," he said. "At this point it appears we're not doing a very good job with any of those."

Those words come from a dedicated cat feeder. The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, however, doesn't seem to agree when it comes to feeding feral cats. The Commission seems to think the feeding is attracting not just cats but also raccoons, who a dedicated Officer says he's seen eating right along side the cats. Do you suppose the dishes were labeled, one for "Cat" and one for "Rac?"

The Fish and Wildlife Commission apparently has a piece of administrative code that outlaws putting out food or even your garbage "in such a manner that it attracts black bears, foxes, raccoons or sandhill cranes and thereby creates a public nuisance." An officer from the Commission has issued a $295 ticket to a well-meaning cat feeder.

So, when Bigfoot comes to your door for a visit, better be careful about feeding him. He may be followed by black bears, foxes, raccoons or sandhill cranes and you might be creating a public nuisance, not to mention aiding and abetting a stroll-away kitty.

Taking A Breather

We've just returned from a little trip to the Miami area and a chance to sample some great food -- not that KW doesn't have its share of fine restaurants, but Miami is -- well, different -- as many of you know. We didn't lug the laptop along and actually didn't miss it. Frankly, it was fun to take a breather from daily blogging, and we have vowed to do it more often during this summer. So you may not see as many columns from as as you might have come to expect.

Also, we're going to be making some technical changes to the site that may limit our ability to publish daily while we get all the code to work the way it should. We are not going to rush things and so the changes will come slowly. We're certainly not computer gurus so we're likely to get stuck and have to ask for a good deal of help. We'll keep you posted as we enter this new phase.