New Yorkers No Longer Able To Purchase Once-Popular Boar’s Head Meat

Product traced back to the Listeria outbreak will no longer be produced by popular deli meat company.

Boar's Head is a supplier of deli meats, cheeses, and condiments. The company was founded in 1905 in Brooklyn, New York, and now distributes its products throughout the United States. It has been based in Sarasota, Florida, since 2001.

Also See: Holy Hoagie! 5 Amazing Sub Shops in the Hudson Valley

Listeria Outbreak and Recall of Boar's Head Products

With an initial reported case of illness on May 29, 2024, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) determined a listeriosis outbreak traced to Boar's Heads products, linked to 9 deaths and 57 hospitalizations as of August 29, 2024.^[Unreported illnesses may have accounted for higher actual incidents of illness.

This represented the largest listeriosis outbreak on record since 2011. The company immediately recalled a large selection of products.

In July 2024, the company issued a recall on over 7 million pounds of its products produced at a plant in Greensville County, Virginia, near the town of Jarratt. On September 13, 2024, Boar's Head announced that the Jarratt plant would close indefinitely. So if you go to your favorite local, Hudson Valley deli, things will look different moving forward. A once-popular lunch meat product will not be available amongst the other Boar's Head products.

Boar's Head Permanently Ditches Liverwurst

According to USA Today, Due to the fatal listeria outbreak, with the "root cause" of the contamination being traced back to "a specific production process that only existed at the Jarratt facility and was used only for liverwurst", liverwurst will no longer be produced by Boar's Head. "With this discovery, we have decided to permanently discontinue liverwurst," the company said in a statement.

Get our free mobile app