Two popular buffet restaurant chains were yesterday ordered to suspend sales of certain seafood products after they were found to contain excessive levels of the bleaching agent sulfur dioxide.
The Taipei City Government’s Department of Health tested a total of 55 samples of aquatic products in the first half of the year, including four of crab, nine of shellfish, 13 of shrimp and 29 of fish. The products were tested for the presence of 48 different types of drugs, as well as heavy metals lead and cadmium.
Among those tested, two failed including crab served by buffet restaurant chain Spice Market (泰市場) — at a branch inside the Eslite Bookstore’s Xinyi branch — which had residue of sulfur dioxide at a level of 0.18g per kilogram; and frozen white shrimp used at franchise buffet restaurant Eat Together’s (饗食天堂) branch in Q Square shopping mall, which contained 0.14g per kilogram of the substance.
Sulfur dioxide residue is not allowed in crabs, while the maximum permissible level for the substance is less than 0.1g per kg in shrimps.
Food and Drug Division official Lin Yi-hsiang (林益祥) said the former was provided by a food company in the city’s Datung District (大同), while the latter came from a firm in New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang District (新莊).
“The two tainted products have been removed from store shelves. The supplier of the crab is to be subjected to a fine ranging from NT$30,000 to NT$3 million (US$959.82 to NT$95,982) in accordance with the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法), while the supplier of the shrimps has been referred to our New Taipei City counterpart for legal action,” Lin said.
Excessive consumption of sulfur dioxide can cause difficulty breathing, diarrhea and vomiting, Lin said, urging the public to keep not to put lids on pans when cooking seafood to allow potentially harmful substances to evaporate.
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