King Arthur Recalls Flour Containing Blue Plastic Balls

King Arthur

A vintage flour label

King Arthur Flour has initiated a voluntary recall of flour sold between mid-December and early February, according to an email sent to the company's "Baking Friends." The recall also was announced on the King Arthur website. King Arthur is the third largest seller of flour in the country.

The issue? Little bright blue polyurethane balls (measuring 7 mm to 9 mm, about the size of a pearl on a typical strand) "were dropped into a very limited number of bags during the sifting stage of the milling process." The balls are "food-safe" and have "no jagged edges." Which is fine if you don't mind bright-blue bread and muffins.

The recall affects a specific lot of 5-pound bags of King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour and King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour.

The following products are included in the voluntary recall:
King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, 5-pound bag UPC 0-71012-01050-9 
(located on the left side panel under the recipe) with a Best Used By Date plus Lot Code (located beneath the nutrition facts panel) as follows:

BEST USED BY LOT CODE
12/26/2013 L12A26B
12/26/2013 L12A26C
12/27/2013 L12A27A
01/18/2014 A13A18A
01/18/2014 A13A18B
01/21/2014 A13A21A
01/22/2014 A13A22B
01/30/2014 A13A30A
01/31/2014 A13A31A

King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour, 5-pound bag UPC 0-71012-4-105-3 
(located on the left side panel under the recipe) with a Best Used By Date plus Lot Code (located beneath the nutrition facts panel) as follows:

BEST USED BY LOT CODE
12/26/2013 L12A26A
12/26/2013 L12A26B
01/03/2014 A13A03A
01/03/2014 A13A03B
01/16/2014 A13A16B
01/17/2014 A13A17A
01/23/2014 A13A23A
01/28/2014 A13A28A
01/31/2014 A13A31A

Any affected products may be returned to the place of purchase for a full refund. For more information, call the King Arthur Flour Consumer Hotline at (866) 797-9178, Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. EST.

In its press release, the Norwich, Vt.-based company assures, "No other lot codes of this product or any other King Arthur Flour products are affected in any way. There have been no reports of injury, ingestion or presence of any of these balls from our customers to date. This voluntary recall is based on the possibility that a ball could be found." (Scavenger hunt!)

King Arthur is America's oldest flour company, founded in Boston in 1790. Its flours are free of unnecessary chemicals and never bleached or bromated. The company offers baking lessons and recipes. This week's recipe is for Braided Lemon Bread.

"If you've already used the flour you purchased, don't worry; it wasn't compromised in any way," King Arthur told customers in the email.

Just know that those things weren't blueberries.

More in food recalls:
- Lean Cuisine Recalled Due to Glass Shards
- [Updated] Whole Foods Recalls Smoked Salmon
- Filthy Peanut Butter Plant Gets Preliminary OK to Reopen
- Trader Joe's Butter Chicken Recalled for Listeria Risk

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