- Click to share on Facebook (Opens in a new window)
- Click to share on Twitter (Opens in a new window)
- Click here to share on LinkedIn (Opens in a new window)
- Click to email a friend (Opens in a new window)
(CNN) - Get ready: many of your favorite foods may contain pieces of things that you might not know were there.
How about some rodent manure in your coffee? Worms in your pizza sauce? Mold in your toast jam?
Oh, and I'm so sorry, chocolate lover. That dark and delicious bar that you devoured could contain 30 or more parts of insects and a pinch of rodent hair.
Called "food defects," these dismembered creatures and their droppings are the unfortunate result of growing and harvesting food.
"It is economically impractical to grow, harvest or process raw products that are totally free of unavoidable, non-hazardous and natural defects," says the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
So while there is no way to get rid of all creatures that could get caught along the food processing chain, the FDA has set standards to keep food defects to a minimum.
Let's review the foods of a typical day to see what else you are eating and did not know.
Breakfast
The FDA allows coffee beans you grind for breakfast to average 10 milligrams or more of animal feces per pound. Up to 4% to 6% of beans per count can also be infested with insects or molds.
While you sprinkle black pepper on your morning eggs, try not to think about the fact that you may be eating more than 40 insect fragments with each teaspoon, along with a pinch of rodent hair.
Did you have fruit for breakfast? Common fruit flies can travel anywhere, from the field to the harvest or the grocery store, get caught by processors or freeze in refrigerated delivery trucks and end up in your home.
lunch
Let's say you packed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for everyone. Good choice!
Peanut butter is one of the most controlled foods on the FDA list; an average of one or more rodent hairs and 30 (more or less) insect fragments per 100 grams, which are 3.5 ounces, is allowed.
The typical serving size for peanut butter is 2 tablespoons (unless you spread them). That means that every 2 tablespoons of peanut butter sandwich would only have about eight insect fragments and a little bit of rodent dirt. ("Dirt" is what the FDA calls these food defects of insects and rodents.)
Unfortunately, jam and jelly are not so controlled. Apple butter can contain an average of four or more rodent hairs per 3.5 ounces (100 grams) and about five whole insects. Oh, and that does not count the unknown number of mites, aphids and other small insects.
Apple butter can also contain up to 12% mold, which is better than cherry jam, which can be 30% moldy, or blackcurrant jam, which can be 75% moldy.
Refreshments
Did you pack some of the raisin boxes for your child's mid-afternoon snack?
Golden raisins can contain 35 fruit fly eggs, as well as 10 or more whole insects (or their equivalent heads and legs) for every 8 ounces. Raisin containers for children have an ounce each. That is more than 4 eggs and an entire insect in each box.
Drinks after work
Any Bloody Mary fan? The tomato juice in that 14 oz Bloody Mary. It could contain up to four worms and 20 or more fruit fly eggs.
And if you're having a fruity cocktail, keep in mind that canned citrus juices that many bars use, can legally have five or more fruit fly eggs or other fly eggs per cup (250 ml). Or that cup of juice could contain one or more worms. Apricot, peach and pear nectars can contain up to 12% moldy fruit.
Dinner
Oh God, the possibilities are endless! Did you know that there can be 450 parts of insects and nine rodent hairs in each 16-ounce box of spaghetti?
Canned tomatoes, tomato paste and sauces such as pizza are a little less contaminated than tomato juice in your cocktail. The FDA only allows about two worms in a 16 oz can.
Do you add mushrooms to your spaghetti or pizza sauce? For each can of 4 oz mushrooms. There can be an average of 20 or more worms of any size.
The canned sweet corn we love can have two or more corn cob worm larvae, along with larval fragments and the skins that worms discard as they grow.
For every ¼ cup of cornmeal, the FDA allows an average of one or more whole insects, two or more rodent hairs and 50 or more insect fragments, or one or more rodent manure fragments.
Asparagus can contain 40 or more scary-looking but young insects for every ¼ of a pound. If those are not found, FDA inspectors look for beetle eggs, whole insects or heads and body parts.
Frozen or canned spinach can average 50 aphids and mites. If not found, the FDA allows larvae of spinach worms or eight whole-leaf mining insects.
Do not forget the spices!
You can also find dismembered insects in many of our favorite spices. Crushed oregano, for example, can contain 300 or more insect pieces and approximately two rodent hairs per 10 grams. To put this in context, a bottle of family-sized oregano is about 18 oz. or 510 grams.
The paprika can have up to 20% mold, about 75 parts of insects and 11 rodent hairs per 25 grams (just under an ounce). A typical jar of spices contains about 2 to 3 oz.
How is this process?
At this point you must be wondering, how do those little heads of insects and pieces of rodent manure count?
"Food manufacturers have quality control employees who constantly sample their packaged and finished products to make sure they are not putting anything against the rules," said food safety specialist Ben Chapman, professor of agricultural sciences and Humans at North Carolina State University.
Sometimes they do it by hand, Chapman said. "They take out 10 bags of a week's production and try to shake what might be here," he said. “Do we have parts of insects in particularly high quantities or was it a particularly problematic time of year when food was harvested? And they make sure they are below the FDA thresholds. ”
What happens if it was a complicated week and many insects decided to sacrifice themselves? Can you get all those eggs, legs and larvae?
"They really can't," Chapman said. But they can take the food and send it to a process called "rework."
"Let's say I have a lot of fresh blueberries with insects that I can't put in a bag and sell," Chapman explained. "I could send them to a blueberry canning operation where they can be boiled and then remove those parts of insects from the top and put them in a can."
It's disgusting. Will I ever eat any of these foods again?
"Look, this is a very, very, very low risk situation," Chapman said. “I see it as a disgust factor versus a risk factor. The parts of insects are disgusting, but they don't lead to foodborne illness. ”
Much more dangerous, Chapman notes, is the possibility that pieces of stone, metal, plastic, or glass arrive along with the harvested food as they enter the processing system. All foods are subject to X-rays and metal detectors, Chapman said, because when they escape, people can be injured.
Foodborne diseases, such as salmonella, listeria and E. coli, which can cause serious illness and even be fatal, are also much more dangerous.
"Cross-contamination of raw foods, cooking them little, not washing their hands and spreading germs from raw foods are the things that contribute to the more than 48 million cases of foodborne illness we have every year in the United States. said Chapman.
Well, said like that, I guess my dislike for that rodent manure in my coffee seems exaggerated.
Perhaps.
