By Donna Campisano, specialist, Communications, APHL

You can’t beat products like bagged salad kits and cut-and-washed greens for their convenience. Just put everything into a bowl, place it on the table and voila—you have a vitamin-packed dish ready to eat in a matter of seconds.

But not so fast.

Bagged greens are no strangers to the US Food and Drug Administration’s recalled list. In August, for example, Taylor Farms voluntarily recalled its Honey Balsamic Salad Kit when it was found that a sesame ginger dressing was mistakenly packaged with the product—a mistake that could be life-threatening to those with allergies to the undisclosed dressing’s ingredients. In December of 2024, Georgia-based Baker Farms recalled bags of its curly mustard after the product tested positive for Listeria monocytogenes, a bacterium that can be deadly to young children, the elderly and those who are immunocompromised. And earlier in 2024, Dole recalled a number of its salad kits after it was discovered the product had been processed on the same manufacturing line as a cheese that was recalled for the possible presence of Listeria monocytogenes. 

What makes bagged greens so problematic?

Pathogens make their way into products in any number of ways.

In the case of bagged greens, contamination can occur when soil, irrigation methods, harvesting tools and processing plants are tainted with an organism that then spreads to the greens. It can occur during transport and storage of the product from the farm to processor to retailer. It can even occur in our own kitchen.

“We had one case a few years ago where Listeria monocytogenes was found in a random sample of a packaged salad that an investigator picked up at a retailer during routine surveillance,” noted Carrie Crabtree, PhD, laboratory division director, Georgia Department of Agriculture. Crabtree explained how the pathogen was identified after it was brought to the lab, where the components were put in a microbiology medium, incubated and analyzed for specific bacteria. Following the presumptive positive result, PCR testing confirmed the presence of Listeria monocytogenes.

“The investigation was stumping us,” Crabtree said, “because listeria likes to live in cold, wet environments. We were surprised when we didn’t find the source in the manufacturing plant, where the lettuce is washed and chopped and chilled. Instead, we found it in the crevice of a piece of harvesting equipment.”

Crabtree explained that bagged greens—and particularly bagged salad kits—can be problematic for a variety of reasons. First of all, they may contain a variety of lettuces and other produce, such as carrots or cabbage, all of which may come from different farms, making isolating the exact pathogen-tainted ingredient (and determining where it came from) more complicated. What’s more, bagged greens are often chopped and washed before packaging. “There’s nothing wrong with chopping, washing or bagging it,” Crabtree said, “but the more you process a product, the greater the chance that a pathogen can be introduced.” And as the Taylor Farms Honey Balsamic Salad Kit recall mentioned above illustrates, dressings can sometimes be mislabeled, mispackaged and harbor their own pathogens.

Take it—or leaf it?

So the question begs: Are bagged greens safe to eat?

“For the average healthy adult, yes,” said Crabtree, who noted she eats bagged lettuce products. “State and federal partners work hard to ensure the food we eat is safe, but the fact is, everything we eat carries a risk,” she said. “I advise people to be aware of sell-by-dates, buy from reputable manufacturers and retailers and practice caution if you are elderly, have a health condition that puts you at risk for more severe disease or you’re feeding one of these products to a young child.”

And what about washing the already-washed lettuce? “It might help remove some pathogens that are on the surface of the lettuce,” Crabtree said, “but there really is no guarantee.”

The post Why Are Bagged Greens So Frequently Recalled? And Should You Eat Them? appeared first on APHL Blog.

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