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Restaurant scrambles to change Thanksgiving menu in wake of E. coli outbreak

Posted at 3:13 PM, Nov 21, 2018
and last updated 2018-11-21 15:13:56-05

The new romaine lettuce recall is causing many to change up their Thanksgiving Day menus.

A popular vegan restaurant and catering company, Pianta, is one place affected by the recall.

“We use romaine every day,” says restaurant owner Michael Moon. “We use about two to three cases of romaine every week, so it's pretty significant.”

The restaurant has thrown out all of its romaine lettuce.

“Essentially, we're just throwing away money,” Moon says.

However, Pianta’s owner says it’s only a small cost to pay for the safety of his customers.

“We don't want to be associated with some sort of outbreak here as a plant-based restaurant. It's scary.”

Until further notice, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is warning everyone to throw out any and all romaine lettuce. That includes prewashed bag lettuce, as well as any other foods stored with it or touching it.

Health officials also to clean out your refrigerator and counter.

Moon says the recall is scary, because this is just the latest recall impacting his vegan, plant-based restaurant.

“We've seen this with spinach; we've seen it with romaine; we've seen it with kale,” Moon says. “So, for someone like us, it's sort of the bedrock of what we're doing here, so it's obviously a big concern.

The CDC is trying to find the source of the E. coli outbreak, which so far has sent dozens of people to the hospital, both in the United States and Canada.