If you find a large dead insect in your dried lentils

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animalcrackers
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19 Dec 2014, 1:03 am

What are you supposed to do? Throw out the whole bag or just remove the dead insect and use the lentils? (It's not an infestation type of situation -- the bag was sealed tight, no holes at all, and it was clearly in the lentils for a looooong time before I bought them.)

What would you do?


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JitakuKeibiinB
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19 Dec 2014, 1:53 am

I'd throw it away. :eew:



jk1
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19 Dec 2014, 3:33 am

I wouldn't use it. I would take it back to the shop and get a refund. The fact that an insect got in the bag probably means that other bags may also contain something unhygienic. I wouldn't buy anything produced by the same company.



traven
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19 Dec 2014, 4:49 am

Take it out , it's a good sign that not everything around it was killed to make some lentils.
If you don't like it, give it to some pet animal you might have or as birdfood http://www.allaboutbirds.org/page.aspx?pid=1142
Food is a natural thing, don't expect it to be made while killing nature.



DeepHour
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19 Dec 2014, 10:46 am

A few years ago, a woman found a dead frog in a bag of peas purchased from Sainsbury's supermarket.

When the story appeared in a national newspaper, the man from Sainsbury's Public Relations department commented, "It was only a small frog".

I thought that was quite funny. :D



Kiprobalhato
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19 Dec 2014, 10:50 am

lol i'd throw out the store


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animalcrackers
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19 Dec 2014, 1:24 pm

Thanks for the responses! (More are still welcome, too.)

It's a difficult decision because I have never found a bug like that in anything before and I don't know the food safety rules about bugs and dried legumes (I think if you find weevils in any dried goods you are supposed to throw them out, but that's all I know) -- and because I got so grossed out. I find bugs (mites, flies, aphids, assorted little beetles, the occasional spider, a caterpillar) in vegetables and fruit quite often, and I just wash them off (or, for native bugs that are still alive and harmless I might put them outside) and it's fine; But those are usually whole, non-decayed bugs, and smaller, and more familiar to me so in my mind they belong where I find them ...this one in the lentils was completely unfamiliar, about 1/2 inch long, missing all it's appendages, and looked squashed and partially decayed (best guess is that it may have been some kind of beetle).

Returning them to the store is a good idea if dead bugs in lentils is a food safety problem, but it wouldn't be worth it for me (going to the store is a fairly big deal because of sensory difficulties + the time and effort of planning the trip and getting there...plus the bus fare to get there would cost almost as much as new lentils.)

I also think the Sainsbury's thing is funny (the comment is funny, not the dead frog).


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