GROSS - Broccoli Worms on Frz Broccoli - What Have You Found on Your Food?

[Familia]

Just gross - Dd was eating dinner with us, and we had broccoli that was a frozen organic bag from Costco.  Dd notices something thin & green on it.  I say that it is just a fiber, until she insists and we pull out the old handy dandy Brock.  Yes, a caterpillar!  Our pieces are full of them, but they blend in so well, I would have eaten it all up without ever noticing.  I picked some off, but, despite my open-mindedness about food, just couldn't take another bite!  Not sure if I can ever eat broccoli again..

What have you found in food, and did it turn you off that food forever?

(this isn't my photo, our caterpillars were more green, probably less mature)

Edited September 19, 2019 by Familia

[BarbecueMom]

Oh boy, guess what was on our menu tonight...

I’m guessing that’s not vegetarian anymore.

[Serenade]

Growing up, we had a neighbor who had a plum tree, and we could have as many as we could pick. So we made plum jam, and froze some, etc.  Well, at one point mom discovered little white worms in one of the batches of plums.  They were small, and I think we ate them anyhow.  She grew up in Germany during and after WWII, and people didn't just throw food away due to a few worms, I guess.

[Tanaqui]

You know that old joke - the only thing worse than finding a worm in your food is finding HALF a worm in your food!

But, hey, eat up - it's only extra protein!

[Melissa in Australia]

We grow most of our own food. Catapillers on  broccoli is pretty normal. I just pay my kids 5 cents per catapiller they find on their plate and keep eating. 

I can only imagine the amount of pesticides they must use to have catapiller fee broccoli. Though I am thinking about trying insect nets just for the brasicas 

[MEmama]

I found a long, thin worm slithering out of a fish fillet once. I FREAKED out.

A quick google search taught me they are very normal, but that marked the end of my fresh fish preparing days. I’ll take frozen and just not know they’re there, thanks. 🤮

[fairfarmhand]

I scrolled past the pictures and the comments just to say I am not reading this thread! Blech!

i try not to tgink about these things or I’d never eat anything but processed food. 

Edited September 19, 2019 by fairfarmhand

[Guest]

Once, I was making cole slaw from cabbages out of our garden. As I stirred up the cabbage I had chopped, I noticed some grey bits. Upon further examination, it was a chopped up slug. 🤢

It didn’t put me off cabbage forever, but it did heighten my skepticism about greens directly from our garden. Gotta check them out more closely! 

Another time I was searing sausages, preparing to make a ragout. I was never able to determine what this was, but as I seared the sausages, they got protrusions all over them, which looked like worms. I don’t know if that’s what it was, but the likelihood of there being worms inside sausages didn’t seem completely implausible. I could not eat it and I have not made that since. 

Oh! Another bad moment with meat was a time I was eating a ham steak and I cut a morsel next to the bone and there was a big ol’ vein opened up in there, looking like a plumbing tube. That just grossed me right out!

I have a weird relationship with meats. I don’t like reminders of its animal origins! 

[Kanin]

I once found what looked like a piece of plastic wrap in a slice of frozen pizza... baked into the crust. And it wasn't a small piece either - about the size of half a sandwich bag. Makes you wonder about food safety big time.

[Melissa in Australia]

I draw the line at wildlife in meat. As I have hunting sons we have had this. Now they know I do not want ANY live wildlife in meat in the kitchen.  I also don't like  strange thing in the freezer. If there are strange things in the freezer they have to be double bagged. Yes ds23 I am talking to you. And if I ever find a bag of  frozen rabbit heads again I will cook them up for you. 

[hellen]

I found tiny worms or larva or something in an unopened container of Trader Joe's pasta.  They were crawling around in there.  I checked the packages for a few years after that, but never had another incident.  I really like Trader Joe's pasta so ten years later, I'm still buying it.  

My kids have found my hair in the food I prepare very rarely.  I think that's gross, but they still keep asking me to make dinner.  

 

[J-rap]

Well I've definitely found tiny worms on veggies -- no big deal.  Veggies are  veggies!  I just rinse them well.  If I find them on anything else though?  Then gross!!

My dh and I started out our married life in the Middle East, and we got into the habit of carefully filtering through everything we ate.  Even a bag of dried beans would have bugs in them.  But as long as it was cooked, I figured it was dead.  I guess it got me used to critters in some food.  

The worst thing I've found though was a box of baby food -- dried rice flakes, that was full of worms.  That was horrible!  They sent me lots of coupons for free boxes after I complained to them.

[Tanaqui]

Worms in dried food are pantry moths. Yes, gross. Harmless, but gross, and they're everywhere. I advise you all to do what I do, which is shove my dried goods into the freezer for a few days after purchase to kill off any eggs.

[Selkie]

I found a live bug in a package of salad greens from Natural Grocers. I set it free out in the yard.

[Familia]

I just don't know whether to laugh, gag, or cry at these!  Completely agree about the worms being better than the pesticides.  The worms sparked lively dinner convo about the fact that we want our food free of the worm, yet willingly consume what we know may be scarier biocide!  It concerns me that deep in my psyche is a nonchalance about the potential danger of processed food.  Yes, frozen broccoli counts as processed food in that sentence.  

But, on the lighter side, I am (squeamishly) 'enjoying' your stories.  I think.

[Xahm]

We get pantry moths from time to time. The grossest was when I was a kid and didn't know about them. I opened some grits and fixed a couple of bowls for my little brothers, not paying attention but thinking it was weird that a couple of moths were in the container. Later, I looked more carefully and noticed lots of the caterpillars crawling about. I had fed my brothers a very protein-rich meal on accident, and I've never told them about that discovery.

A recent gross one was a giant caterpillar inside a bell pepper from my garden. Probably I could have used half of the pepper no problem, but I couldn't feel ok with it. The chickens were happy, though.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Tanaqui said:

Worms in dried food are pantry moths. Yes, gross. Harmless, but gross, and they're everywhere. I advise you all to do what I do, which is shove my dried goods into the freezer for a few days after purchase to kill off any eggs.

Yeah, I’ve been down that road with the pantry moths. Those little critters can persist like mad.

[Familia]

1 hour ago, Tanaqui said:

Worms in dried food are pantry moths. Yes, gross. Harmless, but gross, and they're everywhere. I advise you all to do what I do, which is shove my dried goods into the freezer for a few days after purchase to kill off any eggs.

I've thought about that, but wondered about moisture condensation when coming back out of freezer causing mold problems...but, I guess, with your success, that is a non-issue.

[Melissa in Australia]

I also chuck things in the freezer to kill the weevil eggs. It doesn't cause any problem to the dry  food at all

[Laura Corin]

I don't mind finding bugs on veg; I assume that means lower pesticide residue

[mom@shiloh]

I use moth traps in my pantry and change them out about every six months. 

I grow all of our broccoli and have tried various methods to keep the cabbage moths from laying their eggs there. I still check and double check and triple check. Because.... bleh!

Here's a link:

https://www.organiclesson.com/get-rid-of-cabbage-worms/