Beef recall hits three Clark County sellers

Consumers who have questions about the recall of meat products produced by Rancho Feeding Corp. of Petaluma, Calif., can contact the plant’s quality control manager, Scott Parks, at 707-762-6651. The recall includes:

“Beef Carcasses” (wholesale and custom sales only)

2 per box “Beef (Market) Heads” (retail only)

4-gallons per box “Beef Blood” (wholesale only)

20-pound boxes of “Beef Oxtail”

30-pound boxes of “Beef Cheeks”

30-pound boxes of ” Beef Lips”

30-pound boxes of “Beef Omasum”

30-pound boxes of “Beef Tripas”

30-pound boxes of “Mountain Oysters”

30-pound boxes of “Sweet Breads”

30- and 60-pound boxes of “Beef Liver”

30- and 60-pound boxes of “Beef Tripe”

30- and 60-pound boxes of “Beef Tongue”

30- and 60-pound boxes of “Veal Cuts”

40-pound boxes of “Veal Bones”

50-pound boxes of “Beef Feet”

50-pound boxes of “Beef Hearts”

60-pound boxes of “Veal Trim”

Three Clark County businesses have been added to a list of retailers in six states that received meat products from Rancho Feeding Corp. of Petaluma, Calif., that have been recalled for being from “diseased and unsound animals.”

Those retailers are Butcher Boys, 4710 E. Fourth Plain Blvd., in Vancouver; the Shell station at 16320 S.E. Cascade Park Drive in Vancouver; and the Brush Prairie General Store, 15320 N.E. Caples Road, in Brush Prairie. Managers and owners at the three outlets said they received and sold small quantities of meat from Rancho last year.

The recall of 8.7 million pounds of meat produced at Rancho from Jan. 1, 2013 to Jan. 7, 2014, was launched on Feb. 8. Last Friday, the USDA added the three Clark County retailers to the recall list. It had initially misidentified Butcher Boys as a California retailer.

The government said it has received no complaints of illness from consumption of the meat products. Rancho Feeding is now closed and is under investigation by the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service.

Butcher Boys received 180 pounds of veal through a supplier last October that came from Rancho Feeding Corp. said Peter Kurfurst, manager of the family-owned store. That meat, which was ground into one-pound packages, was sold long ago, he said.

Kurfurst said his shop examines all meat before it is sold. “If it is at all ‘iffy,’ it goes back,’ he said. “We’ve worked too long and hard on our reputation to blow it.”

Kurfurst said he is frustrated that his company ended up being associated with the massive recall.

“We get a little bit of (the meat) and all of a sudden we are thrown into the loop,” he said. He also said he was concerned about the length of time covered by the recall.

“Where was the inspector?” he asked. “Why weren’t they doing their job?”

Brush Prairie General store owner Hak Kim said he received one case of jerky, containing six jars, from Rancho last August. That meat has been sold, he said. A manager at the Cascade Park Shell station said his store had received and sold six bags of jerky from Rancho last year.

In its initial news release, the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said the meat is being recalled because the company “processed diseased and unsound animals and carried out these activities without the benefit or full benefit of federal inspection. Thus, the products are adulterated, because they are unsound, unwholesome or otherwise are unfit for human food and must be removed from commerce.”

The USDA’s Office of the Inspector General is conducting an ongoing investigation into Rancho Feeding Corp.,” the USDA said in a statement.

The recall covers the following: Beef carcasses and boxes bearing the establishment number “EST. 527” inside the USDA mark of inspection. Each box bears the case code number ending in 3 or 4. The products were shipped to distribution centers and retail establishments in California, Florida, Illinois, Oregon, Texas and Washington.