And you know the plants won’t supply their workers either. I know the corona is not the same as salmonella or something but the inspectors are our first line of defense to keep food safe.

the moral integrity of the company producing the food. The Blue Bell plant in Brenham, Texas clearly lost sight of that integrity and so deserves to pay every penny of the judgment against them.

And BTW, I am a long time Texas resident.

Prior to 2015 when they determined that there was listeria contamination they would close the creamery for cleaning. As I noted below, it appears that one of their suppliers was shipping contaminated nuts to them so any time the creamery was cleaned it would be contaminated again sometime afterwards.

They revised their procedures after the 2015 incidents and are holding the ice cream at the creamery for up to 10 days as they complete additional testing before shipping their products. There have been at least two times where they identified listeria contamination while their product was on hold to the public. No other creameries in the country met that standard.

While the owners of Blue Bell are GOP contributors, I don't put all of the blame on them--they just were the first ones that got caught because more than one person died. If there had been only one or two customers that died within a short period of time, it is quite likely that the origins of the listeria contamination would not have been discovered. There were one or two other creameries in other states that were also caught shortly afterwards with the same issues of listeria contamination.

By the way, I lived about a mile from the creamery. Our family sold my father's house in 2013 and it was rented out to a married couple after the buyer renovated the place and bulldozed all of the nice shade trees and flowers in the backyard because the backyard had a slope. The woman worked at Blue Bell and lost her job because of the listeria outbreak.

Quite awhile back they were in the news for distributing bad ice cream. I actually worked with a guy whose daughter was one who got poisoned. She was permanently affected , I didn’t ask him too many details but he said she’d been a straight A student and now required ful time care. They won a million dollar judgement but as you could imagine he was still bitter. We take a lot for granted in this country and keeping the food supply safe is an inherit (?) government function.

The issue is that the funding for inspectors is inadequate and by the time it is determined that something is wrong with a product it has been consumed by the public for weeks or months.

may have been one of the suppliers of nuts for their ice cream. They were able to determine that one supplier was providing contaminated product and that company went out of business.

We used to get it all the time when I was growing up.

They took pride in the fact that they were Texan, with locations nowhere else in the country. You wanted Blue Bell ice cream in California? You had to get it shipped in...

I think Blue Bell was the inventor of the Cookies & Cream flavor.

Shame they turned out to be such sleazebags...

I think the last time I bought some was in 2016. I bought a little pint, so I couldn't get all those special flavors.

I wonder what's gonna happen with them?

Sid Bass (the billionaire investor from Fort Worth) secured a $125 million loan for them after the outbreak. They have some "deep pockets" to rely on if needed.

It's as hard as a rock, but if you thaw it a bit, it isn't bad.

Just pay a fine without admitting wrong doing!

I usually post the news about Blue Bell since I lived for a few years (1999-2000, 2012-2013) in Brenham, Texas where the creamery is located.

I thought of posting here too, but it's so hot outside that I forgot all about it!!

blue bell the maker of blue bunny ice cream?

That is a completely different company producing Blue Bunny ice cream. With a few exceptions for single-serve products, Blue Bell sells only under their own label. The single-serve products without the Blue Bell label are:

Starburst Sorbet Bars
Snickers Ice Cream Bars
Snickers Ice Cream Cones
Twix Ice Cream Bars
M&M Ice Cream Sandwiches

I grew up in Texas and Blue Bell was part of our culture. It was only sold in Texas until maybe 20 years ago) (too small an operation to ship outside of Texas.) It was not long after they started expanding from the little town of Brennon in South Central Texas that they ran into trouble.

I don't know who was responsible for the listeria infection but I didn't give up on Blue Bell , they were like part of the family and I was devastated when they closed down for a while. I was always asking the grocery store when they were going to start production again. I am retired in Mexico now about 80 miles across the border. there is a little store near the plaza that the owner goes across the border to WalMart and HEB and stocks up on items you can't find in Mexico. I asked him that when he saw Blue Bell back on the shelves in the US to bring me a 1/2 gallon of Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla every week. It is as good as my Dad used to make on the old wooden hand crank while I sat on top on newspapers to hold it steady while he cranked.

It may be because of those childhood memories but I think Blue Bell Vanilla Icecream is the best icecream on the market.