Blade tip possibly mixed into smoothie at southwest Japan shop

FUKUOKA — A blade tip may have gotten mixed into a smoothie sold between March 3 and 5 at a shop in the city of Yanagawa, Fukuoka Prefecture, the municipal government announced on March 6.

The roughly 5-millimeter blade tip is possibly in one of eight servings of 200-gram blue papaya smoothies prepared at Karatachi Space, a souvenir shop and cafe set up inside Nishitetsu Yanagawa Station.

According to the Yanagawa Municipal Government, a regional revitalization group member working in the kitchen was cutting frozen bananas at around 4 p.m. on March 3 when the tip of the knife blade came off. It is suspected it may have gotten mixed in with the bananas served over the next few days.

Another regional revitalization team member noticed the tip was missing and reported the incident to the city on the evening of March 5. Anyone who bought a smoothie between the evening of March 3 and 5 and noticed something strange is asked to call the city’s commerce and industry brand promotion section at 0944-77-8722 (in Japanese).

Karatachi Space is managed by the Yanagawa brand promotion council. The council is chaired by Deputy Mayor Tomohiro Nakamura and its secretariat is run by the city.

(Japanese original by Hideho Furihata, Omuta Local Bureau)