Food safety alert: Trader Joe’s recall just grew by 10 million pounds
Nearly 10 million more pounds of Ajinomoto-produced food for Trader Joe’s has been added to an ongoing recall list that started in February.
Chicken fried rice should have some crunch from carrots, corn and peas — but not the shattering bite of glass.
Here’s the recall rundown:
The latest recall
The latest update was released by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on March 20. In the notice, the FDA said that Ajinomoto Foods North America added 9,885,240 pounds of frozen food products, including Trader Joe’s Vegetable Fried Rice, Item #5650233.
Each case of 24 includes 1-pound flexible bags with a UPC marked #00521482 and case UPC # 10052148200001. The Best By date range on the vegetable fried rice is from 2/28/2026 to 11/19/2026.
The products were distributed to 43 states, including Florida, Georgia, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, Texas and California.
The states also include: Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
The recall’s history
On Feb. 19, 3.37 million pounds of Trader Joe’s Chicken Fried Rice and Ajinomoto Yakitori Chicken with Japanese-style Fried Rice were recalled from the United States and Canada after customers complained they had found glass in the product.
On March 3, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration posted a notice to is website to update that recall. Walmart and Sam’s Club were affected by that recall.
That time, Ajinomoto’s recall of chicken fried expanded to 36.9 million pounds of chicken and pork fried rice, ramen and shu mai dumplings over five brands, including Tai Pei Chicken Fried Rice with white meat chicken, vegetables and oyster flavored sauce; Trader Joe’s Chicken Shu Mai with vegetable dumplings and tangy soy sauce packets; and Tai Pei Ultimate Fried Rice with grilled white meat chicken, savory Japanese-style fried rice, Chinese-style barbecue pork, smoke-flavored bacon, vegetables and scrambled egg.
READ MORE: Recall of food products that might have glass now includes Walmart and Kroger
Kroger’s store brand, Tai Pei and Ling Ling were added to Trader Joe’s store brand and Ajinomoto’s brands from the original February recall along with 16 additional products, listed by the USDA along with their lot numbers. That brought the total to nearly 37 million pounds.
Carrots were the likely source of the glass contamination, according to the USDA announcement earlier in March.
What should consumers do?
Return these products to the store for a refund or throw them out. Questions? Contact Ajinomoto Foods at 855-742-5011 or customercare@ajinomotofoods.com.
What about Publix?
Publix also sells some of the frozen Tai Pei products, including cartons of the Tai Pei Chicken Fried Rice. But Publix was not listed on the USDA’s recall notices for these Ajinomoto products.
Publix has listed an unrelated product on its current recalls webpage.
Publix pulled select batches of Market Ground Beef Products produced at the store in the Village Shopping Center on 1236 Thompson Bridge Road in Gainesville, Georgia, on March 13, 2026.
That recall was due to the potential of foreign material in the ground beef, Publix director of communications Maria Brous said on the notice. This recall only applies to that product at that Georgia store.
Toss it or return for a refund. Or contact Publix Customer Care at 800-242-1227.
Miami Herald reporter David J. Neal contributed to this report.
This story was originally published March 24, 2026 at 3:24 PM with the headline "Food safety alert: Trader Joe’s recall just grew by 10 million pounds."
