The U.S. Justice Department Is Investigating Blue Bell's Listeria Outbreak

This is bad news for the ice cream company.

The United States Justice Department is investigating Blue Bell Creameries, reports CBS News, following the ice cream company's connection to a deadly Listeria outbreak. Listeria led to the first recall in Blue Bell's 108-year history last spring. The Justice department reportedly is trying to determine what Blue Bell officials knew about potentially deadly hazards in the company's plants, and when they knew it.

At the time of the recall, Blue Bell CEO and president Paul Kruse said the company was "committed to doing the 100 percent right thing." But, that might not be the case. Former employees claim an ice cream factory in Brenham, Texas, was unsanitary and unsafe. They alleged one machine was "running virtually 24/7," leaving workers with no time to clean it. The machine produced a batch of Listeria-tainted ice cream bars in January, and a few weeks later, it made a batch of ice cream cookie sandwiches that also tested positive for Listeria monocytogenes.

In May, Houston resident David Philip Shockley sued Blue Bell, claiming he "damn near died" after eating Listeria-tainted ice cream in 2013. Shockley said he "consumed a variety of Blue Bell ice cream products contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes," two years before the company issued its voluntary total recall. The recall came after three deaths were connected to tainted ice cream from Blue Bell, which was forced to lay off 1,450 employees.

In July, the Justice Department announced it would consider legal action against companies deemed to be responsible for foodborne illness outbreaks. Associate Attorney General Stuart Delery said civil and criminal penalties are possible: "We have made a priority holding individuals and companies responsible when they fail to live up to their obligations that they have to protect the safety of the food that all of us eat."

In September, a former peanut executive was sentenced to 28 years in prison for his company's role in a massive salmonella outbreak that killed nine people. Stewart Parnell was convicted of knowingly shipping salmonella-tainted products, and he received what is believed to be the stiffest penalty ever related to foodborne illness.

Blue Bell resumed ice cream production in July, and its products first returned to stores in August.

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Doughnut Raccoon Bypasses Pizza, Goes for Glazed Fritter

Is this the most adorable case of shoplifting ever?

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Carl's Jr. Pivots from Slutburgers to Turkey Burgers

The company says it is the first fast food chain to offer turkey patties.

Is turkey the new beef? According to CNBC, Carl's Jr./Hardee's brand plans to launch a line of turkey burgers nationwide. The company's CEO Andrew Puzder explains that the switch to antibiotic-free patties is partly aimed at targeting millennials who have come to expect better quality food. (What is not immediately clear is if millennials prefer turkey to beef — or slutburgers, for that matter) In a phone interview with CNBC, Puzder said, "Even though most people know us as the brand to introduce indulgent, creative burgers, we also have a long history of introducing better-for-you fare, which is a surprise to some people."

The brand is known for its unnecessarily sexy and parody-inspiring ads which depict scantily-clad models — and spokesperson MMA fighter Ronda Rousey — devouring its huge burgers. While its obnoxiously sexual and over-the-top commercials have received their share of criticism, the brand has also made headlines for its out-of-the-box menu offerings like a hot dog and potato chip-stuffed burger, a biscuit/doughnut hybrid, and pepperoni pizza-topped fries.

Despite these over-indulgent menu creations, lately Carl's Jr. seems to be just as focused on healthier fast-food options. While the healthier options are a plus, they don't come without a price. The all-natural turkey burger switch took over a year to accomplish and will cost customers about 80 cents more per burger.

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Why Los Angeles Is America’s Best Dining City in 2015

'Top Chef' vs. Boston Teamsters: Emails Prove Nasty Labor Dispute

How the city's politics got in the way

The dispute between the Boston Teamsters and the producers behind Top Chef continues to grow. Recently, emails between Top Chef employees and city officials were released. According to the Boston Globe, the email exchange released was between the show's talent scout, Derek Cunningham — and other Top Chef crew — and Boston's director of tourism, sports, and entertainment, Ken Brissette. The first email from Cunningham to Brissette arrived on the morning of June 5, 2014, where Cunningham complains to the city official about Teamster harassment over using nonunion workers on set, stating, "The phone calls to my cell have started. I know it's only going to get worse."

The email exchange revealed that while show producers detailed the issues they were having, members of the mayor's administration were unable to resolve the conflict. An email from the show's producer, David O'Connell, stated, "It's unfortunate that we will most likely have to leave Boston early" and "I don't know when I'll be ably [sic] to bring another nonunion show to Boston while the threat if [sic] the Teamsters looms large." Despite the complaints from the Top Chef team, the Teamster-friendly mayor's office was able to do little to squash the problem.

The emails show efforts made by the show and the city to try to diffuse the labor disputes between Top Chef producers and the city's Teamsters. It was this unresolved conflict that led to the September indictment of four Teamsters from Boston for extortion, alleging they harassed and intimidated Top Chef producers during filming. The U.S. Attorney's Office stated that the men were accused of having "yelled racial and homophobic slurs at the film crew and others, threatened crew and cast members, and shouted profanities." Members of the crew have also alleged that Teamster members went as far as to verbally attack host Padma Lakshmi during filming. The Teamsters immediately refuted the allegations, releasing a statement that included, "If the allegations were true Milton Police would have taken appropriate action."

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Pastries Born in France, Raised in South Korea

Restaurant in China Replaces Servers With Phone App

Diners place orders using the On We Chat messaging app.

Rather than eliminate tipping — something restaurants in the U.S. are now experimenting with — one Beijing restaurant is getting rid of waiters all together. According to KMOV, Chinese restaurant Renrenxiang has replaced servers with China's most popular messaging app, On We Chat. Diners can use the app to call in their order based on the restaurant's menu. They are then given a number which is called out from a speaker system when their food is ready. Suffice to say, hospitality is included in such transactions.

Owner Liu Zheng hopes to eliminate overhead costs by doing without many of the typical services found inside a conventional eatery. Zheng explains that in following the "technology development trend," there will be four no's inside Renrenxiang: No waiters, no cashier, no merchandising, and no chef. Diners are able to place their order and pay directly from the app, while a team of cooks turn digital orders into meals.

Renrenxiang is one of many Chinese restaurants to do away with waiters, but most aren't using a phone app, opting instead to replace them with copycat robots. In 2012, Haohai Restaraunt in Harbin, China made headlines when it opened as a fully robot staffed eatery, followed by an army of noodle-making robots created to replace cooks. All-robot kitchen staff and drone waiters who fly through the air to deliver your order are becoming more common in the tech-savvy country. While some are using technology to replace humans with a robot counterpart, others like Renrenxiang and Genki Sushi — an automated sushi restaurant in Hong Kong — are finding a way to eliminate the middle-man, sending orders directly from the customer to the kitchen.

This isn't altogether a foreign concept. For the last few years restaurant chains have experimented with tablets on tables as a way to encourage diners to place orders directly from a tablet instead of with a human server. Studies show, though, that diners prefer human interaction to digital ease, even though the system works out well for restaurants. Diners spend about 20 percent more, on average, when ordering via tablet verses from a human server.

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