Listeria - Not Flooding - Caused The Great Eggo Crisis of 2009

As you may have heard by now, flooding at the Eggo plant has created a nationwide shortage of Eggo waffles.  The situation is so dire that sellers with stockpiled stores of Eggos have taken to selling them on eBay with a starting bid of $49.95, although one wonders how they will ship the frozen Eggos to keep them from thawing!  

Kellogg, the maker of Eggos, is vaguely blaming "flooding" for the crisis.  However, the truth is somewhat less savory.  The Eggo plant, located in Atlanta, GA, was shut down when inspections turned up a listeria contamination in some of the sampled Buttermilk Eggo Waffles.  Kellogg recalled Eggo waffles on September 2nd.  The facility has been closed for industrial sanitization for September and October, and the effects are now being felt in our nation's grocery stores' frozen food aisles.

So why the story about flooding?  Well for one thing, "flooding" sounds better than "a national recall due to listeria infection, and a month of sanitizing our equipment to make sure consumers don't get sick."  One can only imagine that Kellogg's PR department had flights of joy when the plant experienced some minor flooding the day after they had to close for sanitization procedures.  Which ensured that their "flooding" story was not entirely untrue.

ABC News interviewed Oscar Garrison, "assistant commissioner of consumer protection at the Georgia Department of Health."  Garrison informed them that the supposed flooding had affected the parking lot at the Eggo making facility, but that flood waters did not enter the Eggo plant itself.

ABC News is careful to point out that Kellogg has not been mentioning "the L word" (listeria) in any of its public communications about the Eggo Crisis, instead referring to "equipment issues" and "enhancements and repairs."

One of the interesting side effects of the plant closure is that it isn't just Eggos which are missing from store freezers.  The last time I was at Safeway, I noticed that they were also barren of Safeway store brand frozen waffles, as well.  This simply highlights the fact that store brands are often (always?) made at the same plant as the name brand version.  

Eggos were developed in the early 1950s, when the Dorsa brothers introduced frozen waffles to the grateful American populace.  The Dorsa brothers originally called their invention "froffles," a combination of the words "frozen" and "waffles."  However, people noted the eggier taste of the waffles, and the Dorsa brothers officially changed the name to reflect the eggy reputation in 1955.

Listeria is a toxic bacteria, named after medical pioneer and surgeon Joseph Lister.  Listeria causes the disease listeriosis, which has a mortality rate of up to 25%.  Listeria is a relatively rare food borne disease, and in most cases causes only a fever and muscle aches for seven to ten days.  

Listeria tends to be far more serious in vulnerable populations - pregnant women, the elderly, young children, and immunocompromised people.  Listeria concerns are why pregnant women are advised to avoid possible sources of contamination, including unpasteurized soft cheeses and dairy products like feta, brie, camembert, and bleu cheeses.