---
title: "A massive lettuce recall hits home as local restaurants shake up their salad menus"
type: "News"
locale: "en"
url: "https://longbridge.com/en/news/293099269.md"
description: "A massive cyclosporiasis outbreak linked to shredded iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms, distributed via Taco Bell, has sickened over 1,600 people across five states. In response, local restaurants have removed raw leafy greens and bagged salads from their menus, while Taco Bell indefinitely removed the affected ingredient. The incident has raised concerns about food safety tracking and caused Yum Brands' stock to drop 2.8%, with analysts predicting near-term sales pressure."
datetime: "2026-07-18T13:15:12.000Z"
locales:
  - [zh-CN](https://longbridge.com/zh-CN/news/293099269.md)
  - [en](https://longbridge.com/en/news/293099269.md)
  - [zh-HK](https://longbridge.com/zh-HK/news/293099269.md)
generator: "portal-rs"
---

# A massive lettuce recall hits home as local restaurants shake up their salad menus

By Bill Peters

Some independent restaurants are throwing out all their bagged lettuce, while others have found ways to keep serving customers their leafy greens

Local restaurants say they're waiting on government guidance in the wake of a cyclosporiasis outbreak.

Like other restaurants in recent days, staff at the Guardian Brewing Co., a restaurant serving up inventive brews and pizzas in Muncie, Ind., threw out their bagged salad mix and temporarily pulled salads from their menu. Unless cooked, vegetables such as green peppers, green onions, tomatoes and mushrooms were also off-limits.

Making those decisions wasn't difficult as concerns grew over a cyclosporiasis outbreak that has sickened thousands nationwide, according to Dawn Brand Fluhler, the restaurant's general manager. Customers, she said, don't seem to be sweating the menu changes.

"We have a few really die-hard salad customers and a few folks who love the fully loaded nachos with all of the vegetables," Fluhler said. But their reaction, she noted, ran along the lines of, "Ah, dang it - but we understand."

Now, as health officials make progress in tracing the outbreak's source, she and others across the industry are waiting for the all-clear from the government to get items safely back on the menu, and more clarity on the fallout from an unprecedented surge in cases this summer.

Caution still persists among restaurant analysts, investors, customers and owners, after health officials reportedly connected the outbreak's source to shredded iceberg lettuce shipped to Taco Bell from salad-greens producer Taylor Farms. That outbreak has led to bigger questions about the U.S. health system's ability to track and stamp out foodborne illnesses.

Fluhler said that, for the time being, staff members are prepping around two-thirds of what they were before, a move that's helped lower costs, since the owners don't have to buy those products. The staff has extra time to chop and cook items more carefully, she said.

Likewise, Mamas' Pizza and Gelato, in Milltown, Ind., has thrown out all its lettuce and other greens, and it's only serving spinach cooked. The restaurant said in an email that it wouldn't buy any more until the outbreak ended.

Benedette Hardwick, the owner of the Red B Restaurant in Idabel, Okla., said the restaurant had temporarily stopped serving things like kale, parsley, green onion, raw broccoli, spinach and cilantro. As of Friday morning, she said, she was still making sense of the reports about health officials' findings.

"We'll reintroduce items as soon as we feel comfortable that the situation is under control," she said.

But salad sales haven't dropped at all, she said. The restaurant has been posting about the outbreak on social media and putting notices on doors about the items that have been removed. Some customers are leaving vegetables off hamburgers and sandwiches, but people are still ordering salads.

"We've already started receiving salad orders for our lunch rush today," she said early Friday, "so our customers either aren't overly concerned with this outbreak, or they trust us enough to take the necessary precautions to try and keep them safe."

Taco Bell has said it would remove and replace contaminated lettuce out of an abundance of caution. The chain, in a statement on Thursday, said that it would indefinitely remove "potentially impacted lettuce from a supplier in select states." It added: "The affected ingredient from our supplier is being indefinitely removed from our supply chain nationwide and will be replaced within 24 hours in select states."

But state and federal health agencies are still trying to gauge the scope of the outbreak.

Michigan has recorded more than 5,000 cyclosporiasis cases, according to the state's health and human-services department. However, state and federal figures can differ, as the federal government works to confirm cases.

The CDC said the outbreak was linked to shredded iceberg lettuce served at Taco Bell across five states: Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and West Virginia. The agency has reported 1,644 confirmed cases, on pace for a record, with 94 hospitalizations. No deaths have been reported. The agency said it was also investigating other unrelated outbreaks.

The reports followed growing concerns among customers over the illness, which the CDC said can cause "sometimes explosive bowel movements." The agency advised people not to eat shredded iceberg lettuce from those five states. It also said the Food and Drug Administration was "working directly with the supplier," which it did not name, to figure out whether contaminated lettuce went elsewhere.

Shares of Yum Brands (YUM), which owns Taco Bell, finished around 2.8% lower on Friday. Some analysts noted that it could take weeks for sales to rebound.

"Near-term comp pressure appears likely, and with Taco Bell trends already moderating, we see potential for shares to reset further before troughing," BMO analyst Andrew Strelzik said in a research note on Friday, referring to comparable-store sales, an industry metric that generally tracks sales at locations open a year or more.

Strelzik said Taco Bell drives around 40% of Yum's divisional operating profit. Thus, he said, "any sustained U.S. traffic hit could be material."

Taylor Farms did not immediately respond to a request for comment. On its website, the company said it was voluntarily removing from the U.S. market all iceberg lettuce sourced from central Mexico.

"While the FDA traceback is indicating a specific independent farm that represents less than 1% of the U.S.'s iceberg lettuce supply as the potential source of the outbreak, we have removed all iceberg lettuce from the region indefinitely," the company said in the statement.

Taylor Farms said that its branded salads and kits don't contain iceberg lettuce and aren't associated with the outbreak.

McDonald's (MCD), in 2024, said that Taylor Farms supplied it with fresh onions linked to an E. coli outbreak at the chain that year. Taylor Farms, based in Salinas, Calif., has production facilities in the U.S., Canada, Mexica and Europe.

Strelzik noted, however, that the outbreak at McDonald's was confined to ingredients served in the chain's Quarter Pounders, making them easier to remove. Shredded lettuce, he said, "spans much of the Taco Bell menu, meaning the exposed volume and operational disruption could run higher here."

Data from Placer.ai, a company that analyzes consumer foot traffic at restaurants and retailers, suggested there have been early signs of disruption. Figures from the firm shared on Friday showed that on Tuesday, July 7, traffic at Taco Bell was 2.3% higher than a typical Tuesday for the chain this year. On July 11, as worries about the outbreak grew, foot traffic was 5.8% lower than a typical Saturday.

Similar drops were seen at chains like Panera Bread, as well as at salad specialists Chopt and Sweetgreen.

"While we only have a few days of data to work with, Cyclospora headlines and product removals at some \[quick-service restaurant\] chains appear to be weighing modestly on visitation," Placer.ai said in an email.

Sweetgreen (SG) investors seemed to be breathing a sign of relief, with the stock jumping 13.8% on Friday and snapping a sharp four-session decline.

The chain tried to reassure its customers in a post to X on Friday, saying it doesn't use iceberg lettuce.

"From the outset of the investigation, we have been in close contact with our suppliers to determine whether any ingredients in our supply chain have been identified as part of the investigation," the chain said. "To date, none have been."

The outbreak has raised concerns about the food-safety system in the wake of federal funding cuts and regulatory changes. Tyler Evans, a health physician and the co-founder of the Wellness Equity Alliance, said the system is only as good as the doctors who are willing to ask patients questions. It also hinges on the interviewers, inspectors and epidemiologists willing to track down customers and trace ingredients back through their production and distribution networks. Without that labor force, he said, contaminated goods can keep being shipped.

"An outbreak like this is not evidence that the system caught a problem," he told MarketWatch. "It is evidence of how much has to go wrong, and for how long, before the system notices."

He added: "A food-safety system that can only identify a contaminated product after thousands of people report the same illness is not a prevention system. It is a documentation system."

-Bill Peters

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

07-18-26 0915ET

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> **Disclaimer: This article is for reference only and does not constitute any investment advice.**