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Tuesday, May 24, 2022

Don't mess with my peanut butter and other sad stories

I eat the same thing for lunch every day. For real, day in and day out, unless I'm out to lunch. I have half an apple, quartered, smothered in peanut butter. Specifically, Jiff crunchy peanut butter. My grocery of choice does not carry standard Jiff, only small jars of organic, natural. Too expensive for me.

My brother-in-law very kindly picks up a two pack of Jiff for me whenever I ask. Their grocery chain carries the real deal, in the several pound two pack. I can barely lift it.

I needed to open one of the new jars, and hefted to pack from the shelf, cut the plastic binder and then bethought the current Jiff recall I'm reading about. I googled the problem and found my two jars of Jiff were in the dragnet. The news item said throw them out, but that's something over ten dollars. I'd prefer my money returned.

Tom would be in the neighborhood and pick up the jars for return. And I would go to Kreigers and buy one of those tiny organic jars to tide me over. Which I did. The peanut butter aisle had a gaping shortage of peanut butter. There was no Jiff, merely empty rows of shelves. I settled for Skippy, which I do not care for, with its inch of peanut oil on top of the jar. I do hate that!

Please J.M. Smucker, fix your manufacturing problem quickly. Before I'm even an inch down the Skippy jar. I will gladly throw that peanut butter away.


My new car is a new-to-me 2014 Suburu Forester. I have yet to master radio stations and cruise control. Tuning the radio turns out to be not my problem. Every time I got to 90.3 on the FM dial, all I heard was classical music. In desperation I asked my oldest daughter what the heck was going on. Her text:

NPR used to be 90.3, but the Classical station that forever ago was 95.5 before selling that to the Christians is there now. WCLV sold 95.5 and moved to 104.9. Now WCVL swapped with WCPN and moved to 90.3, the old WCPN. To sum up, NPR is on 89.7 Kent (closest) and 104.9 (hinterlands).

All those CVL's stand for Cleveland, which is 45 minutes north of me, and carried a mix of NPR programming I enjoyed. Kent is WKSU, a small town east, in Portage County, with a decent university, but I always felt the NPR station was staffed by college students. WCPN is a commercial station playing classical music. I had far more interest in programming from Cleveland, a town with a world class university, Case Western Reserve, than a farming town with a decent university. 104.9 is River Radio out of central Ohio. That is south of route 30, where the state turns red.

There will not be a test. I barely followed that. This was not a recall, but a lack adequate funding, I am sure. I cannot find any article on the demise of Cleveland's NPR.

23 comments:

  1. Sorry about your Jiff Peanut butter recall. We use the smaller sizes Natural with honey in both creamy and crunchy. Both were on the recall list. We threw out the ones we've been eating (?#*!) and will return a recently purchased unopened jar. We love this PB too... and eat it as you do with apples and also with bananas... or by the spoonful. Hope they fix the problem soon as I don't want to buy a different brand.

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  2. Finding the stations on the radio and changing the hours in summer or winter time are always my most difficult problems when I change a car.

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  3. Big sigh on the peanut butter debacle. I hope you can have a 'proper' lunch again soon.

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  4. Our NPR is WFSU, 88.9. It is an excellent station. There are many things about my Prius that I still don't understand and I've had it for yonks now. I even get out the instruction manual which is bigger than some phone books used to be and I swear- whoever put that index together was evil. I can never find anything I want. I generally either just push things until something pops up that I want or else google it. This works pretty well.
    Good enough, at least, which is obviously NOT what Skippy is. And as we all know, choosy mothers choose Jif.

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  5. I am married to a Jif man and he is beside himself! I also buy it in the big two-pack.

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  6. Hari Om
    Even on my budget, for peanut butter I have to branch out to WholeEarth Organic Smooth (it's like gold); I spread it very sparingly on wholemeal toast... oh yeah... Hope yours comes back online pronto! YAM xx

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  7. I have had my Honda Fit for 2.5 years and this week found my radio station. Accidentally while I was pushing another button while driving in rain, changing the wipers. So I'm leaving audio set as is. I'll never find it again otherwise.

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  8. The radio in the car has the option to pick "favorites". I have NPR favorited, so I don't have to know how to find any other stations. Jim is big on classic rock, me, not so much. In the PNW we have Adams peanut butter which is made by Smuckers. It's no stir and has zero sugar. When we were in Tucson we ate Skippy, but didn't really like it. For the life of me, I don't understand why Smuckers doesn't go nationwide with Adams.

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  9. That Jif recall applies to Canada too. I had a jar of creamy Jif peanut butter which I bought a while ago so it probably wasn't within the recall parameters, but I threw it out anyway. Better safe than sorry!

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  10. You might try your area WalMart. They usually have a variety of peanut butters including your Jiff. My jar wasn't in the recall. The natural food stores (Natural Grocers or Whole Foods) might have a fresh grinding machine to try some of their peanuts-into-butters. My new to me car is still "training" me. I sometimes push the radio volume button instead of the start button hiding behind the steering wheel. Linda in Kansas

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  11. Now if they ‘messed around with’ my Vegemite I’d be ropable.

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  12. Whole Foods allows you to grind your own peanut butter and it is quite good. No preservatives makes it better for you. New cars always take time to learn all the bells and whistles.

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  13. I like peanut butter but I don't get the gourmet stuff!

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  14. It is kind of maddening when the stations flip around. Happens here a lot. I never know from one month to the next if the station is going to be blasting head banging crap or country and western. I've quit listening to our public broadcaster too. I've heard it described as the gay covid channel. Those two subjects seem to be prominent in their broadcasts now. Fortunately we have a small private station called Heritage Radio that we've fallen head over heels for.
    I'm eating Kraft peanut butter these days, even if it's a bit too sweet.

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  15. I hope you get your peanut butter back soon.

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  16. Life's small problems I think peanut butter recall and radio stations after the massacre of those poor children yesterday.

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  17. I get the "just peanuts" brand with no additives like sugar, etc. I turn it upside down to put the oil at the bottom.
    XO
    WWW

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  18. It's always something, isn't it?

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  19. I generally buy Adams peanut butter although I hate the oil on the top and always make a mess trying to stir it in. John has Jif at his house and has eaten about 2/3 of the jar with no ill effects, so he refuses to throw it out! It took me a long time to figure out my Forester and her gadgets. I'm still learning!

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  20. I usually have a jar of good peanut butter (the cheap stuff is inedible, though I have bought Jiff before) and I prefer the dark roast stuff which is made of nothing but peanuts. Good on toast with Marmite or soy sauce - I believe.

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  21. My wife makes fun of me because I'm a big fan of Reeses peanut butter

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  22. I also have a lunch routine. It's a peanut butter and cucumber sandwich. The peanut butter is from Whole Earth and is sugar-less. Why do so many brands of peanut butter include sugar? Not only unnecessary but it totally spoils the taste.

    I never listen to music in the car. I prefer silence. I'm funny like that.

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  23. We buy the Laura Scudders organic peanut butter. It's just peanuts and less than 1% salt. Yes, the oil separates but once stirred in and kept in the refrigerator it stays mixed. All the major brands, like Jiff, have sugar and salt in them along with other unnecessary or GMO (soybean oil) ingredients. Food manufacturers put sugar in everything to the detriment of our general health. Marc has peanut butter on Jewish rye toast (the only kind we eat) for breakfast every morning. I rarely eat peanut butter myself but when I do it's a sandwich for lunch with some sort of fruit, a little honey, and lettuce.

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