As of Sept. 25, 2025, 20 people from 15 states tested positive for the outbreak strain of Listeria after consuming pre-cooked pasta meals.
Five days later, on Sept. 30, Nate’s Fine Foods—the supplier of the affected pasta—expanded the types of pasta recalled, from merely linguine to farfalle, after a sample of the linguine pasta tested positive for Listeria monocytogenes—a bacterium causing foodborne illness most dangerous for pregnant women, newborns, older adults and people with weakened immune systems.
By Oct. 31, the number increased to a total of 27 infections, 25 hospitalizations and 6 deaths.
The U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA), U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA FSIS) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), have been involved in the ongoing investigation of the outbreak with partners in multiple states.
The Food and Drug Administration is a federal agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services responsible for protecting public health by regulating and ensuring the safety, effectiveness and security of human and veterinary drugs, medical devices, food, cosmetics and tobacco products. The agency continuously monitors products after they are on the market, gathering data to update labeling, issue recalls or take other actions if safety issues arise.
These FDA-issued recalls included pasta products from Washington grocery stores like Trader Joe’s Cajun Style Blackened Chicken Breast Fettuccine Alfredo, Albertson’s Bowtie Pasta Salads and Meals and Fred Meyer’s/Walmart/QFC Basil Pesto Bowtie Salad and Smoked Mozzarella Penne Salad, showcasing the scale of the issue.
However, pasta wasn’t the only product on the list: cucumbers with Salmonella contamination and shrimp products with Cesium 1 have also been recalled.
Naturally, buyers have been concerned for their safety and trust in the food industry. In past years, the FDA has been criticized for shortages of essential products like infant formula in 2022, failure to prevent harm to patients一as seen with the opioid crisis一and the lack of confidence in the safety and effectiveness of some approved drugs, like Aduhelm for Alzheimer’s. Could this mean that nothing is safe to eat anymore unless we grow our own gardens, a privilege that not many of us have?
While these recalls can be unsettling, they serve as a safeguard and indicate that the food safety system, particularly with laws like the FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act, is working to identify and remove contaminated or mislabeled products from the market.
Visit FDA’s “Recalls, Market Withdrawals, & Safety Alerts” section of their website at www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts to stay up to date on the current recall information.
