Biggest Food Recalls In Meijer's History

In the past few years, food recalls have become more common, and a number of big ones have occurred at Meijer. The Meijer grocery chain has been keeping a running list of recalls on its website since 2010, but we found a few big incidents that go back even further.

While several of them have been with Meijer branded products, some of the really big cases have been a part of a nationwide recall from other brands. There's not just one reason that food products get recalled at Meijer. Our list of the biggest recalls includes circumstances such as product mislabeling (usually related to undeclared allergens), foreign objects found in products made in the same batch, packaging defects, and possible bacterial contamination. Even though there are often multiple recalls a month for food items at Meijer, our list outlines the largest ones in its history, both specific to Meijer as well as affecting other retailers nationwide.  

One of the most recent large food recalls at Meijer involved Johnsonville's Polish Kielbasa. The particular product was a 12-ounce package of turkey sausage. Meijer announced the recall on March 8, 2024, but the sausages hit the shelves at Meijer and other stores between January and February of 2024 across 11 states. The affected states with Meijer locations were Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Around the country, the recall affected 4,721 cases containing 35,430 pounds of meat that Johnsonville had sent out to various retailers, including Meijer.

So, what was wrong with these sausages? Two customers bought a pack and found black rubber in their kielbasa. While there weren't any confirmed reports of injuries from the foreign object, Johnsonville suggested that anyone who had bought the sausages should just throw them away instead of risking the chance of finding a piece of rubber in their food. Meijer offered a full refund for anyone who wanted to return their packaged Polish Kielbasa to the store.

Meijer was involved in a big recall related to possible foreign objects in Banquet Chicken Strips Meals on September 3, 2023. The meals consist of frozen chicken strips with whole kernel corn and macaroni and cheese. This recall was instigated by Conagra Brands, who manufactured the product on June 20, July 11, and July 17 of 2023, affecting a total of 245,366 pounds of chicken strips. Meijer carried meals from all three production lots with expirations dates ranging from December 2024 to January 2025. 

Conagra decided to recall all the meals in those lots after a customer injured their mouth while chewing a chicken strip and biting down on a piece of plastic. Nobody else complained of an injury or finding plastic, but Conagra decided to operate with caution. The manufacturer and Meijer asked anyone who had bought one of the recalled meals to either throw them away or return them to the store. Meijer offered a full refund for customers if they brought them back.

A big charcuterie tray recall on January 30, 2023, occurred with a store-brand product: Frederik's by Meijer Spanish Style Charcuterie Sampler Tray. The six-ounce package contained three types of meats: uncured salchichon salami, jamon serrano, and uncured chorizo cantimpalo. The affected products had a sell-by date of April 15, 2023. While the only affected product at Meijer was the charcuterie tray, the recall affected 53,000 pounds of cold cuts nationwide. Elsewhere, the recall extended to other deli meat products and charcuterie trays by brands like Boar's Head, Del Duca, Gourmet Selection, and Colameco's Primo Naturale.

The producer of the charcuterie tray, Daniele International, recalled these meats due to possible contamination with Listeria monocytogenes. The recall was based on the fact the company found Listeria in some products during a routine inspection. Nobody had actually reported a Listeria illness from consuming the charcuterie when the company sounded the recall alarm. Still, Listeria infections can be deadly, and the CDC notes they are especially dangerous for people who are pregnant, 65 and older, or immunocompromised.

When Meijer announced the recall, it asked customers to stop consuming the affected charcuterie product. The store was willing to refund the sales amount to anyone who brought it back.

Another January 2023 recall found Meijer removing 25 different lots of Armour Vienna Sausages from its shelves. The affected 4.6-ounce cans of sausages included Armour Chicken Vienna Sausage, Armour Vienna Sausage six packs, and Armour Vienna Sausage Original. The recall counted a total of 295,089 cases of sausages Conagra Brands had sent out to retailers, weighing a whopping 2.58 million pounds. 

Conagra recalled the sausages due to a concern that a packaging defect could lead to a spoiled product. Even more worrisome was the fact that the spoilage couldn't necessarily be seen or smelled. It would be easy to consume the products and become sick without realizing you had eaten bad sausages.

While the only Conagra products that Meijer carried from the recall were three types of Vienna Sausages, it affected a few other brands and products on other retailers' shelves, too: Goya, Great Value, and Kroger Vienna Sausage, as well as Hargis House Potted Meat. Meijer asked customers not to eat any of the sausages it had in its stores from the affected lots, and instructed they be returned to the store for a refund.

On September 16, 2022, Meijer announced a recall on one flavor of the microwavable Healthy Choice Power Bowls from the freezer section of the store: Korean-Style Beef. There was just one lot of power bowls affected by the in-factory mixup, but it came out to 4,770 cases, for a total of 22,000 pounds of product nationwide.

Instead of Korean-Style Beef Power Bowls, some boxes contained Healthy Choice Italian Chicken Sausage and Peppers Bowls instead. In addition to this mix-up being a disappointment for your taste buds if you were expecting Korean beef, the chicken sausage bowl contained milk. The main concern was that people allergic to milk would think the product was safe to eat since the labels didn't list milk as an ingredient.

While some people contacted Valley International Cold Storage Acquisition to complain about the mix-up, there weren't yet complaints about the product making anyone sick when the company issued the recall. Customers who were disappointed about buying the wrong product or who were allergic to milk could either throw it away or return the product to Meijer for a refund.

An even earlier labeling mix-up happened with P.F. Chang's Beef & Broccoli, which Meijer recalled on July 31, 2022. This was another recall instituted by Conagra and it affected 119,581 pounds of food at various retailers, including Meijer.

The recalled product was a 22-ounce frozen family-sized package with eight servings of P.F. Chang's popular Beef & Broccoli dish. Like the Healthy Choice power bowl mix-up, there was a different meal inside the box than what the label indicated; instead of getting Broccoli & Beef, you would have found Orange Chicken. A major problem with the mislabeling was that P.F. Chang's Orange Chicken contains eggs, which wasn't listed as an allergen on the Beef & Broccoli packaging.

You could opt to throw the box away or take it back to Meijer for a full refund. Of course, some people who were fans of both dishes likely just ate it as long as they weren't allergic to eggs.

One large recall that only happened at Meijer occurred on March 9, 2020, when the chain discovered a labeling error with Meijer Mixed Nuts With Peanuts & Sea Salt. The affected bags had three different sell-by dates in July, September, and October of that year.

The problem with the mixed nuts was that they contained an ingredient that wasn't listed on the bag: Brazil nuts. Nut allergies aren't necessarily all-encompassing, so there was a risk that someone not allergic to the mix of nuts listed in the bag may have a life-threatening allergy to Brazil nuts. Thus, a formal recall was essential to ensure nobody with a Brazil nut allergy accidentally ate from this bag of nuts.

While nobody had reported any allergy mishaps by the time Meijer caught the mistake, the company still asked customers to stop eating nuts from the package and offered a refund upon return. The store's current mixed nuts product does not list Brazil nuts among its ingredients.

Meijer's recall of Healthy Choice Power Bowls on May 23, 2020, was related to the presence of foreign objects. Since the recall was for several different flavors, Conagra had to remove 34,173 cases of its Power Bowls in the U.S. and Canada. The ones Meijer carried were Turkey Sausage & Egg White Scramble, Unwrapped Burrito Scramble, Pesto Egg Scramble, and Chicken Feta & Farro.

If you ate one of these frozen meals, there was a chance you might have bitten down on small rocks that somehow ended up in the bowls. Some customers actually did bite down on rocks and complained to Conagra, which is what got the recall started in the first place. Luckily, the rocks didn't seriously injure anyone before the company announced a recall.

Meijer urged customers not to eat the products lest they chomp down on a rock. If you brought it back to the store, you could get a refund and buy yourself a rock-free bowl.

On November 21, 2019, the U.S. found itself in the middle of a huge recall of romaine lettuce related to an E. coli outbreak. At Meijer, the recall affected everything from its pre-made salads and bowls to its romaine lettuce selection and salad bars. Meijer immediately removed nine Meijer brand salads, 12 types of Dole salad bowls and salads, 12 salads and lettuces from Taylor Farms and Earthbound farms, five types of Bonduelle RP Bistro Bowl Salads, and two types of Ready Pac salads. It also tossed 11 products with romaine lettuce from its Bridge Street Market location. Plus, it got rid of 99 types of romaine lettuce and removed romaine lettuce off the salad bar at two locations. 

When all was said and done, more than 75,000 pounds of lettuce products were recalled in various establishments across the U.S. The deadly outbreak of E.coli connected to romaine lettuce raged from the end of September until the end of December. While nobody died from the outbreak, the CDC reported that 85 of the 167 people infected with the bacteria across 27 states ended up in the hospital. Fifteen of those experienced kidney failure from the bacterial infection (specifically, hemolytic uremic syndrome).

When Meijer removed the affected romaine lettuce products from its shelves, it instructed customers to stop consuming what they'd purchased. Plus, customers could bring back any of the salads or lettuces on the recall list for a refund.

Meijer announced on April 9, 2019, that it was recalling 1-pound packages of Meijer Ground Beef. The recall included nine different types with a sell-by date of April 10 (the next day). Even though the sell-by date was only a day out, the recall affected 40,000 pounds of ground beef in Meijer stores, including some that had already been sold.

JBS Plainwell Inc. instigated the recall because customers had complained about finding hard pieces of green plastic mixed in with the ground beef. While there weren't any reports of injury, a recall was the most logical step. Luckily, it only affected Meijer stores in Michigan and Wisconsin. However, things took a while to get rolling since the USDA found out about the issue on April 5, but the recall didn't take place until four days later.

Customers were asked to avoid eating ground beef sold at the stores with potentially contaminated products. If they hadn't already consumed the beef named in the recall, they could return it to the store for a refund.

Meijer has had a lot of flour recalls over the years, but the biggest one occurred on June 3, 2016. Five types of Gold Medal Flour in different sizes were part of the recall, due to possible E. coli contamination. Overall, the recall affected other General Mills flour brands Meijer didn't carry, as well as bread mixes, brownie and cake mixes, muffin mixes, pancake and biscuit mixes, and even some meat and poultry products that used flour.

Flour is involved in a lot of recalls because the raw grains can sometimes pick up bacteria in the field that aren't killed in the grinding and bleaching process. Thankfully, nobody died from the E. coli in this flour, but the CDC reported that 63 people in 24 states got sick, and 17 of those ended up in the hospital. All things considered, it was also fortunate that only one of the hospital patients ended up with kidney failure (hemolytic uremic syndrome). All the illnesses happened between December 15 of the previous year and September 20, 2016.

Once Meijer realized it had problematic flour on its shelves, it issued a recall. It also asked customers to stop using the affected product and offered a full refund upon return.

Meijer recalled its Barber and Meijer branded frozen stuffed chicken breasts from its stores on July 13, 2015, because they were making people ill. Among the affected products, the store listed nine varieties and sizes, including cordon bleu, broccoli stuffed, chicken kievs, and asparagus stuffed. To ensure all affected stuffed chicken products were discarded, the recall extended to products made from February 17 to May 20. In total, Barber Foods recalled 1.7 million pounds of frozen stuffed chicken products from retailers around the U.S., including Omaha Steaks brand products, too.

The worry was that some of the Barber and Meijer frozen stuffed chicken breasts might be infected with Salmonella Enteritidis. Because the products were sold raw, handling the infected chicken or undercooking it could lead to illness. The recall went out after some people got sick around June 24. The CDC traced the frozen chicken products to 15 illnesses in seven states. While no one died, four people ended up in the hospital. It turned out that those who were hospitalized were resistant to treatment by two types of antibiotics.

Meijer asked its customers to toss any recalled stuffed chicken breasts that were still in their freezers or to take them back to the store for a full refund.

On April 8, 2015, Meijer joined stores around the U.S. who had to pull Sabra Classic Hummus from its shelves. Meijer sold several sizes of the product as well as a dual pack that contained both the classic and garlic flavor. Around the country, 30,000 cases of hummus had to be removed from the shelves at various retailers due to the recall.

The decision to recall such a large volume took place after inspectors at Sabra Dipping Company found Listeria monocytogenes in the area of the factory where the hummus was made. Even though nobody had gotten sick from the hummus yet, the company went ahead and instigated a recall to stave off any potential illnesses.

Meijer asked its customers to stop eating from any containers of Sabra Hummus Classic they had purchased. Customers could either throw away the potentially contaminated hummus or return it to the store for a refund.

Meijer's turkey recall in August 2011 was part of one of the largest food recalls in U.S. history. Luckily, Meijer only had to get its Honeysuckle brand ground turkey off the shelves. However, around the country a total of 36 million pounds of Cargill turkey was involved in the first round of recalls, with 185,000 recalled in a second round. The turkey recall also included Kroger and Spartan store brands, as well as Shady Brook Farms and Riverside brands.

The turkey, which had come from the Cargill factory in Springdale, Arkansas, between February 20 and August 2, was pulled from stores because of possible Salmonella Heidelberg contamination. All total, the CDC reported that 136 people in 34 states fell ill between February and November, along with one death. This strain of Salmonella was especially tenacious and resistant to several types of antibiotics.

Luckily, Meijer hadn't received any customer complaints about illnesses related to the Honeysuckle brand turkey before the recall. However, it removed the products just the same.

Meijer was involved in a deadly recall related to its peanut products between 2008 and 2009. Meijer didn't take action until January of 2009, when it recalled two store-brand crackers and two types of ice cream. Soon after, it also recalled two types of Meijer dry-roasted peanuts and four types of ice cream treats. Nationwide, the recall included over 3,900 different peanut products.

This recall was huge, not only in terms of the volume of affected products but also the number of people who fell ill. The CDC reported that 714 people in 46 states and one in Canada became sick from Salmonella Typhimurium after eating the peanut items. Of those infected, 24% were hospitalized, and nine died. The sicknesses raged on between September 1, 2008, and March 31, 2009.

There was no clear indication that the products Meijer pulled from its shelves were contaminated with Salmonella. However, the ones removed were made from peanuts processed in the same Georgia factory that investigators connected with the outbreak.