Image via WikipediaI call them tiny black insects, but the maker of San Giorgio pasta refers to them as "infestation."
I remember buying three boxes of the pasta at ShopRite -- because they were on sale -- even though I had never tried the brand before.
I put the packages -- spaghetti, linguine and angel hair -- in an above-the-counter cabinet with other brands of pasta and packages of dried Asian noodles, and basically forgot them.
Then, my wife used the spaghetti for dinner one night and in draining the cooked pasta, found a trio of tiny, black insects. She put them in a napkin and brought them to the hospital to show me.
When I got home, I sent a message to the company from its Web site, and last week, I received a letter of apology from Ronzoni Foods Canada/New World Pasta, with coupons for two free pounds of pasta or other San Giorgio products:
"We are confident that it [infestation] did not take place in our manufacturing facilities or warehouses," said Natalia Francois of the company's Consumer Affairs Center.
The quality system includes "high manufacturing temperatures, and careful shipping and storage of finished goods" to prevent infestation.
"Unfortunately, products may become infested once they leave our control and enter the distribution system.
"Retailers and distributors do not take precautions to prevent infestation.... Moreover, except for a tin can or glass jar, insets can penetrate virtually any type of packaging on the market today."
We just emptied the cabinet that holds our dried pasta and noddles, bottles of pasta sauces, energy bars and other snack and food products, and vacuumed the plastic shelf lining before replacing everything.
When I first opened the door, I saw a tiny, black insect crawling on the bottom of the cabinet frame.
Update
On Oct. 4, my wife opened another box of San Giorgio pasta and found more little, black insects she referred to as weevils. She immediately threw that pasta and a second pound of unopened pasta into the garbage, recycling the boxes.
I found the two coupons the company sent me for free San Giorgio pasta or another product and threw them into the recycling, too.
We'll never buy it again, no matter how cheap.
Not to burst your bubble but, those are in everything you eat. All cereals, grains, flours, dried pasta, rice...starchy things.. etc. There is no way to really avoid them.(And not really any company's fault either) They are way safer to be eating than a bunch of chemicals(to help prevent them that companies use) and preservatives, that slowly build up in your body instead. What happened is they probably got to a higher temperature and hatched. This happens all the time. But yeah. Won't make you ill or anything, rest easy.
ReplyDeleteWhat nonsense.
ReplyDeleteYuk...I was uneasy for finding a black noodle in my elbows. Not gonna purchase San Giorgio
ReplyDelete