This morning I was looking through some cans in the garage and pantry and found that the S&W Premium Ready-Cut Diced Tomatoes cans was bulging. I sent an email contact to http://www.swfinefoods.com/ to see how they handle these sorts of situations.
Call 800- 252-7033
Monday - Friday, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm ET
Write
S&W Fine Foods Consumer ServicesP.O. Box 193575San Francisco, CA 94119-3575
The cans I have are Best By Mar 31 09
With a code 5B 6228H8 19:54
Then I did some research and found the following.
Cans bulge primarily because of a potentially deadly bacteria fermenting in it, which causes a type of food poisoning known as Botulism. DO NOT PURCHASE A CAN WITH BULGES. Botulism can kill you.
botulism /bot·u·lism/ (boch´ah-lizm) an extremely severe type of food poisoning due to a neurotoxin (botulin) produced by Clostridium botulinum in improperly canned or preserved foods.
There is lots of info about this topic. They all say the same thing, do not purchase or eat a can that has expanded/bulged it could make you very sick or ill.
10 comments:
I too found a can of S&W Organic Ready-Cut Diced Tomatoes with a bulging can. Coincidentally the can also had the Best By Mar 31 09 date. I have contacted S&W and am awaiting a reply from them. I kept the bulged can and threw away the remained of the two 8-packs that I purchased from my local Costco.
Same exact trouble with same date on cans purchased from Costco!
same problem, same date.
Same problem, same date. My can whooshed air out when punctured. I will call S&W
Again, same problem, same date.
yes, the cans are still out there. I didn't check the expiration date today but the can I purchased had a Mar 31 09 date. S&W Italian recipe diced tomatoes. The same whoosh, too. Thanks for posting, everybody.
Hey y'all, just a little tip. It is not a good idea to open a can suspected of botulism infection. Just the tiniest bit can kill you, and it will reproduce! The USDA (lousy though they are) even recommends double bagging them in plastic before tossing them.
In any case, doesn't sound like botulism here, maybe another mistake at the factory?
I just opened a can of the S&W Premium Diced Tomatoes, heard a swoosh of air escape and immediately googled to find out if it was safe to eat under these circumstances. I found this blog. My dates are the same Mar.09and I just purchased this can from Safeway.
SO car seat - did you eat the tomatoes and if so are you still with us? I opened a can of Ro-Tel tomatoes this evening, got the "whoosh" but thought it might be air going IN filling a vacuum created in the canning process. We ate the tomatoes so I'll let you know if we get sick!
A little about canned foods. Tomatoes are high acid foods, botulism cannot grow. You can have them swell from thermophyllic spoilage caused by storing at too high of a temperature. Garage shelf in hot climates is not a good place. Won't taste good, should smell bad, won't kill you. Best by dates are the same for everything made that year. Hope that helps.
Post a Comment