In a drive very recently, a whopping 226,400 pounds of hamburger meat was recalled from prisons in Oregon and California as they were found stale.

The 20-pound boxes of ground beef from One Great Burger of Elizabeth, N. J., were given clean chit earlier by a Safety Inspector of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to be shipped in through two distributors in June. But later one of them was found to be discoloured and giving out foul odours and returned.

The USDA informed that "The review uncovered evidence to show that the establishment repackaged and recoded returned products and sent them out for further distribution to institutional customers."

A Company spokesperson, Mr Frank Tobin said yesterday that the boxes were stopped short of being fed to thousands of prisoners. He added, "We're not pointing fingers right now at anybody but ourselves."

Fortunately, there are no reports of anyone falling sick as the product was never consumed by anyone.

The suspected meat was packaged in 20-pound boxes with the label of "ITEM #02044" and carried the "EST. 34575" USDA Mark of Inspection, according to a USDA declaration.

The products were manufactured between January 2010 and May 2010 and surprising had a different "packed on" date of July and November. Though there is no such serious cause of threat, yet the USDA has asked people to visit a physician in case they feel sick.