Pizza outlet gets FDA notice for discrepancies

MUMBAI: Maharashtra FDA served an improvement notice to Pizza Hut’s franchise owner Sapphire Foods India Ltd in Goregaon this past week citing 11 violations and asking it to make further rectifications to avoid legal consequences. The notice follows action against an outlet of the pizza chain in Aurangabad that was shut down for three days from April 3 to 5 for “failure to amend mislabelling and display violations.”

The regulatory body has pointed to “misleading ingredient labelling” after finding that a cheese pizza variety had “just 1.5% cheese”. It has also hauled up the popular chain for “undisclosed use of cheese and paneer substitutes, “excessive salt levels, missing allergenic warnings, and inadequate separation of vegetarian and non-vegetarian items”.

FDA commissioner Abhimanyu Kale told TOI: “We expect leading brands to be mindful of their role towards serving healthy and safe food.”

“The white cheese dressing used in the pizza contained a mere 1.5% cheese powder, with the primary components being water and refined soybean oil,” said Kale. Therefore, labelling such an item as ‘cheese’ is misleading and a violation of Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, he said.

FDA also pointed out “high saturated fat and sodium content” in certain items and said they should be clearly displayed to inform consumers. FDA officials said it is mandatory for restaurants to analyze their popular food combinations in terms of nutritional facts at least once in six months and mandatorily maintain such records.

Some establishments were also found to be using cheese analogues instead of real cheese and paneer, misleading customers and potentially engaging in “financial fraud”, the FDA notice read.

Shailesh Adhao, joint commissioner (food) said at some of the outlets, raw and cooked food items, as well as vegetarian and non-vegetarian items, were not stored properly in freezers. Some were using non-food grade packaging material for packing readymade food items. FDA also said allergenic ingredients were not properly highlighted on menus or display boards for consumers with allergies at risk.

The company told TOI that Pizza Hut and franchise partners use only FSSAI-approved ingredients sourced from licensed suppliers. “We take every precaution to serve safe, hygienic and high-quality meals. As a standard protocol, all our non-veg and veg products are segregated at every level in our restaurants,” the company said. The company said they operate with an open kitchen format, allowing customers to observe their food being prepared safely and hygienically.

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