Taiwan Railways assures customers its popular bento did not use recalled cooking oil

Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) has assured the public that its popular classic pork chop bento did not use cooking oil from batches affected by a recent contamination scare.

The controversy arose after soybean salad oil produced by Zhonglian Oil was found to contain "benzopyrene," a Class 1 carcinogen. This led to a recall of approximately 4.58 million kilograms of bulk soybean oil supplied by Taishan Enterprise, covering products from April to June.

TRA's Taipei-Kaohsiung division stated that the soybean salad oil used in their bentos is supplied by Taishan Company. Following an inventory check, they confirmed that the specific batches of oil implicated in the recall were not used. The TRA also presented inspection certificates from their contracted supplier, verifying the safety of the oil used.

Despite the concerns, sales of the TRA's classic pork chop bento remain robust. The bento sells over 9.31 million units annually, averaging about 25,000 bento boxes sold daily across various stations. Customers were seen queuing at stations like Taichung High Speed Rail and Wuri on Monday.

TRA has also proactively replaced the affected oil batches with alternatives that comply with food safety regulations, ensuring that daily production and supply of their bento boxes are not impacted.

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classic pork chop bento did not use problem batch oil