{"id":250826,"date":"2026-04-04T00:44:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T00:44:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/250826\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T00:44:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T00:44:18","slug":"fresnos-raw-farm-cheese-recall-may-only-be-the-next-step-in-fda-fight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/250826\/","title":{"rendered":"Fresno’s Raw Farm Cheese Recall May Only Be the Next Step in FDA Fight"},"content":{"rendered":"

After more than two weeks of fighting with the FDA, Fresno\u2019s Raw Farm dairy issued a voluntary recall Thursday on its cheddar cheeses, which the agency says caused E. coli.<\/p>\n

The FDA announced<\/a> that the raw milk and cheese producer would voluntarily recall some of its cheese products. The order came after nine people got sick, with eight of them reporting they had eaten unpasteurized cheese products.<\/p>\n

Seven of those people identified Raw Farm, a widely recognizable brand, as the culprit.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Mark McAfee, owner of Raw Farm, told GV Wire that his decision to do the recall was to stop FDA \u201charassment.\u201d He said the recall was only on a few batches that stores had already pulled.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a battle, sometimes a win means getting back onto store shelves,\u201d McAfee told GV Wire in an email. \u201cThe FDA refused to stop the onslaught unless we did something. So we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cheese Not Easy to Test for E. coli<\/p>\n

The FDA on March 14 had urged McAfee to issue the voluntary recall. After the company refused, the FDA, the CDC, and other state agencies sent investigators to the Fresno facility to test for E. coli in preparation for what could have been a mandatory recall.<\/p>\n

The FDA says no pathogens have yet been identified in the Raw Farm cheese. McAfee said the tests done at his own farm have not returned positive E. coli tests. He has complied with previous recalls.<\/p>\n

While direct tests on the cheese have not yet conclusively returned positive E. coli samples, a California Department of Public Health spokesperson told GV Wire in an email that testing can be difficult with cheese.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe pathogen may be present in low quantities and\/or be unevenly distributed throughout the cheese, yet still cause human illnesses,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cCDPH considers Raw Farm raw dairy the source of the outbreak based on this strong epidemiologic data, despite the negative laboratory testing results from a limited sample of retail products.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raw Farm to Petition Federal Judge on FDA Actions<\/p>\n

McAfee told GV Wire that the FDA has been pressing him to pasteurize his product and still market it as \u201craw,\u201d something he said would be mislabeling. He said being under an FDA consent degree, he can report FDA misconduct to a supervising federal judge under the premise that they are trying to force him to commit fraud.<\/p>\n

Questions sent to the FDA by GV Wire have not been returned.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe refuse to commit consumer fraud. We refuse to destroy the bioactives found in raw cheese,\u201d McAfee said. \u201cThe FDA is not our consumer. The FDA is demanding that we mislabel. \u2026 We refuse.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After more than two weeks of fighting with the FDA, Fresno\u2019s Raw Farm dairy issued a voluntary recall…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250827,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":{"0":"post-250826","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fresno","8":"tag-fresno","9":"tag-fresno-headlines","10":"tag-fresno-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}