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Several local school districts use the same food vendors who have admitted using lean finely textured beef — known as “pink slime” — in their products.
Schools received letters from suppliers in March after a national uproar over LFTB. Districts received assurances that they were not purchasing “ammonia-treated lean finely textured beef.”
Vendors, though, initially failed to tell schools that some of their products still include LFTB that is not treated with ammonia.
After this newspaper raised questions about what food suppliers were telling schools, those suppliers acknowledged that they are indeed using LFTB in their meat, although not treating it with ammonium hydroxide.
Whether that is technically “pink slime,” school food supervisors in Hamilton, Middletown and Fairfield said they were satisfied with the food products they serve students.
“I heard about that, but that is not the case with ours,” said Hamilton Schools Dining Services Director Cinde Gorbandt, who is a contractor for the district through Chartwells School Dining Service.
Cindy DeZarn, who manages the Middletown City Schools food services for Sodexo, a food management service, said, “My understanding is that our vendors do not use the pink slime.”
LFTB came under scrutiny after news reports described the process of separating it from fat and treating it with ammonium hydroxide to kill possibly harmful bacteria. The product is mixed with ground beef to make it leaner and less expensive.
Supporters of LFTB say it’s a safe product. Detractors shiver at the idea of what they call a distasteful additive, especially when it might be served to their children in school.
Gorbandt said Hamilton uses Tyson and J.T.M. as its suppliers, but only gets turkey and pork products from J.T.M., one of the suppliers that has admitted to using the lean, finely textured beef.
“My contract management company did their checking, so I’m really not concerned at all,” Gorbandt said.
Joe Maas, co-owner of J.T.M., which supplies food to many area schools, defended LFTB, which has been deemed safe for human consumption.
“It’s beef. Period. End of story,” Maas said. “It’s not an additive. It’s not a filler. It’s not an ingredient.”
David Jewell, Food Service Director for Edgewood City Schools, said he wasn’t concerned either.
“We did not have any problems,” said Jewell, adding that his district suppliers are Sysco and Ellenbee Leggett. “We always do a review when there is an issue like this, as we do every year to see if we need to make any additions or changes. It has not been a problem here.”
Gina Gentry-Fletcher, spokeswoman for Fairfield City Schools, said that the district gets its meat from AdvancePierre and uses Tyson products and are assured that they are “pink slime-free.”
“We are part of the National School Lunch program, so everything we serve is closely monitored,” she said.
Many schools contacted had in their files a March 9 letter from Advance-Pierre, a widely used food supplier. In that letter, the company said it did not (underlining “not” in two cases) purchase LFTB from Beef Products Inc. or ammonia-treated LFTB from any vendor.
Three beef suppliers primarily serve the area’s schools: AdvancePierre, J.T.M. and Tyson, which on March 12 said that some of its products contain LFTB while listing 30 products that do not include “pink slime.”
The other two companies’ statements were less forthcoming. Eventually, in conversations and emails, AdvancePierre and J.T.M. this newspaper that they sometimes use the product.
In a March 28 letter, AdvancePierre wrote, “We do use LFTB in some of our products, however (underlined), AdvancePierre Foods does not purchase ammonia-treated LFTB.”
Although reports about “pink slime” — a term first used by a U.S. Department of Agriculture scientist a decade ago — have existed for years, interest spiked after a March 7 ABC News report on the subject. By then, McDonald’s, Burger King and Taco Bell all had stopped using it in their ground beef, according to a Congressional Research Service report dated April 6 called “Lean Finely Textured Beef: The ‘Pink Slime’ Controversy.” Others had expressed concern about the nutrition of the boneless lean beef trimmings used in the process of producing LFTB.
Staff Writers Kyle Nagel and Brandon Smith-Hebson contributed to this report.
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