ANOTHER MASSIVE FRIDAY RECALL

It's been, like, months since we've had an honest-to-God Friday Recall, but it's also been a while since we've had a 20-ton beef recall for E.Coli. The most interesting thing here is the lede in the story from this Iowa paper (rewritten from an AP story): "In an announcement that will have dire consequences for both consumers and producers, an Illinois firm recalled more than 400,000 pounds of beef on Saturday." (My emphasis). But don't be fooled by that last word - USDA says this was in fact a Friday Recall.

One other item of note: "Some of the steaks in the recall were packaged under the Applebee's brand name." Heh. Applebee's. What losers. We made the mistake of going to an Applebee's recently, thinking they'd have A vegetarian option, maybe even, you know, an appetizer, a gardenburger at triple the price, whatever, but no such luck. They lost the entire six-person party due to their utter cluelessness. As far as real veggie options, Mc-Frickin'-Donald's puts their menu to shame. At a restaurant named after APPLES. So when I see this I can't help saying... enjoy your steak, patrons!

UPDATE 8/27: Frank Ybarra, spokesman Applebee's, said the company's best initial estimate "is that only about 80,000 pounds of this involved Applebee's." Ybarra said it was not likely that Applebee's still has any of the suspect meat because "this is the kind of inventory we would burn through pretty quickly." Well, that's reassuring. So only 40 tons of Applebee's meat was potentially contaminated with a deadly pathogen... and was served to, and eaten by, customers. I feel safer already!