Chipotle and Qdoba Pull Jalapenos From Restaurants, Here’s What You Need To Know
A salmonella outbreak sees these chains rushing to remove tainted produce from their menus.
Chipotle and Qdoba have pulled jalepeño peppers from their menus in response to a Salmonella outbreak that’s affecting 27 states, with hundreds of people reporting symptoms.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said its data indicates jalepeños are the cause: “Epidemiologic and traceback data show that jalapeño peppers from Sinaloa, Mexico and distributed by Coast Citrus Distributors are the source of this multistate outbreak.”
“After being notified about the outbreak, Chipotle Mexican Grill and QDOBA stopped serving affected jalapeño peppers. QDOBA restaurants are also no longer serving jalapeño peppers,” they added. “Given their actions to remove product from their stores, CDC and FDA do not consider there to be a current ongoing risk from these establishments to consumers in this outbreak. Coast Citrus Distributors has agreed to recall jalapeño peppers linked to this outbreak.”
The two restaurants are working with the CDC to make sure more people aren’t getting sick on their watch. At the time of writing, Chipotle and Qdoba have identified 27 “illness clusters” across locations in seven states.
“The health and safety of our guests and employees is our highest priority”
The CDC said that the salmonella emerged on June 19 and stretched to July 20 and that determining a sick person’s diagnosis takes around 3-4 weeks. On their official website, the restaurant traced the jalapeños in question to Mexico and assured patrons of their plan of action.
“The health and safety of our guests and employees is our highest priority,” a Chipotle representative said. “We have a robust ingredient traceability system. And, upon learning of a potential Salmonella outbreak in the supply chain impacting wholesalers and restaurants, we identified jalapeños from a particular grower in Sinaloa, Mexico and distributed by Coast Citrus Distributors as a common ingredient from a common lot. We proactively removed them from the restaurants where they had been distributed, and replaced them with product from different growers”
They continued, “The recalled jalapeño peppers are no longer in Chipotle restaurants. And, given these actions, the CDC and FDA have said they do not consider there to be a current ongoing risk from Chipotle restaurants in this outbreak.”
Qdoba has said that they are “cooperating with public health authorities as they pursue an active investigation into an outbreak of Salmonella Javiana. Out of an abundance of caution, we have proactively removed jalapeños from our restaurants at this time.”
The news comes weeks after Taco Bell was caught up in a Cyclosporiasis outbreak involving tainted lettuce, which resulted in thousands of cases of explosive diarrhea, and left 2 people dead.
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