ew what's that a grub the food and drug administration allows for a certain number of
insect parts to be present in the foods we buy so let's find out more with 10 foods that are being
produced with bugs lisa eats bugs spices not just spices spice he knows about the spice salt and
pepper are staples in our diets most of us season our recipes with both of them but you should know
that about 475 bug parts could end up in about 50 grams of ground pepper that does seem like
a lot of insect legs and heads peppering up your plate ground cinnamon is allowed to contain up to
400 insect fragments for every 50 grams typical cinnamon jars hold about 42 grams so when you
really think about it any cookies that are made with this cookie friendly spice or other baked
goods that contain cinnamon therefore might not be considered vegan even if the other ingredients in
the recipe deemed themselves there's no fly in my soup sorry ground marjoram can contain up to 1175
fragments per 10 grams typical margarine containers hold about 18 grams fresh oregano
can contain about 300 insect fragments for each 10 grams but ground oregano can have way more
about 1250 insect fragments for every 10 grams you will never think of your spice collection
in the same way when you look at your jars you'll be wondering just exactly what you're staring at
figs i don't want these figs according to the fda food defects are just a part of the normal process
of growing and processing food apparently they don't present any health hazards as long as the
amounts stay below the action levels listed the fda allows one defect in fig paste insect heads
are within all fig pastes the fda handbook says that up to 13 insect heads are allowed to be in
every 100 grams of fig paste they may enter the product at any point in time before the
figs are harvested after the figs are harvested and during the processing of the figs figs are
considered a fruit but they're also technically an inverted flower figs bloom inside their pods
which are connected to the fig plant flowers need to be pollinated in order to reproduce but
because a fig's flower is hidden inside itself the pollinator has to crawl inside the fig in order to
bring the pollen directly to the flower i pick up some pollen over here sprinkle it over here
it's inside the fig flower where female wasps lay their eggs this is a symbiotic relationship
the relationship between the special fig wasps and the figs is mutually beneficial
they each need the other in order to reproduce however if the wasp burrows into a female fig
she cannot lay her eggs she will die of starvation instead when she brings pollen into the internal
flowers of the fig she pollinates it and then the fig quickly ripens for everyone to enjoy
specifically there's about one dead wasp per fig you won't ingest a live wasp its insect skeleton
will have disintegrated before we even have the chance to chomp on the figs fakes produce faicon
which is an enzyme that breaks down the insect's body it turns it into protein which gets absorbed
by the plant when you feel crunching while eating figs it's not the dead wasp you're crunching down
upon it's the fig seeds mushrooms and spinach a nice safe world full of mushrooms think about how
many dishes you eat which contain both mushrooms and spinach your favorite salads your favorite
quiches both are full of these vegetables well there are some added ingredients in these dishes
you might not have known about if you want to avoid eating mites those tiny arachnids which
are related to ticks then avoiding mushrooms would be a great idea kicking mushrooms around mushrooms
are known to have the highest amount of mites with approximately 75 mites allowed for every
100 grams of canned or dried mushrooms you'll find mites in canned or frozen spinach as well
spinach is allowed to have up to 50 mites or thrips or aphids per every 100 grams but
only if it doesn't have two or more spinach worm larvae which exceeds three millimeters in length
the bugs must share the space we can see why some of these fda rules turn people completely off of
their favorite foods some people plainly have no clue that these bugs and bug parts
accompany their meals tomatoes maraschinos fruit juices you look like a tomato with a mustache
imagine all of the recipes you eat which are full of tomato sauces family favorites like
spaghetti and meat sauce pizza ravioli and the list goes on we imagine grandmothers ladling their
homemade tomato sauces over so many different pasta dishes we savor the family recipes handed
down from one generation to the next we picture family dinners where italian dishes are comfort
foods for our bodies and our souls well did you know that maggots are allowed to be in a whole
bunch of tomato products canned tomatoes can have up to one maggot per 500 grams and tomato juice
and tomato paste can have up to one maggot per 100 grams each a nominal amount of insect parts
may even be detected in ketchup tomato plants are grown in soil and insects feed off of them so the
insect fragments just may be on the plants when the plants are processed ketchup is made from
vinegar and sugar garlic and onions and tomatoes traces of insects may of course be found in the
spices added to the ketchup during flavoring an allowable mold count is also permitted in ketchup
name is products together with ketchup and mustard a sample of maraschino cherries is considered all
right according to the fda as long as no more than five percent of the cherries are rejected because
of the maggots they contain citrus fruit juice and cans can contain up to one maggot per every
cup but the juice that does have a maggot cannot have five or more fly eggs as well everything from
mites to snails love to indulge in fruit juice too mushrooms can have up to 20 maggots of any
size for every 100 grams or up to 5 maggots if they're longer than 2 millimeters maggots are
considered an aesthetic defect not sure that we could see them but this is how they're categorized
coffee coffee coffee coffee right as in i really need coffee taro is an insect control company
they study how many bugs and insect fragments the fda allows to be found in packaged foods
and then they calculate approximately just how much that would amount to per person over a year
one of the most shocking totals they've come up with is the amount of insect fragments that are in
your cup of coffee according to their estimates after just one year of drinking coffee you can
actually have ingested up to 136 080 insect fragments don't give up your brew just yet
there is a way around this as reported by a well-known entomologist it is the pre-ground
coffee that contains ground-up cockroaches he came up with this knowledge through one of his
experiences and shared it to inform others of his newfound knowledge the entomologist had
been traveling with a professor who had always insisted on only drinking coffee made from beans
ground in coffee shops this was at a time when there were no starbucks shops on every corner
and coffee shops were quite far apart but the professor insisted even if it meant they were
driving for an hour or more every morning out of their way just to get to those coffee shops
the professor was allergic to cockroaches and what he had discovered was that every time
he drank coffee made from pre-ground coffee beans he suffered from an allergic reaction
as he had discovered large piles of beans get infested with cockroaches in the field where
they're harvested and it is almost impossible to remove them completely therefore when the beans
are ground so too are the leftover cockroaches but parts of cockroaches in ground coffee are allowed
by the food and drug administration fda as long as they don't make up more than a certain percentage
the way around this if you're a caffeine junkie and the thought of ground cockroaches in your
coffee makes you kind of queasy is to do as the professor did and only seek cups of coffee
in coffee stores where you see them grounding the beans from scratch better yet you can buy yourself
a small coffee grinder purchase your own beans and then proceed to grind them yourself that way you
can have way more control of just what is going to go into your filter and then what exactly is going
to be going into your cup peanut butter someone has been in my peanut butter there's a small
chance that the peanut butter you're spreading on your toast has cockroach bits in it the fda allows
an average of approximately 30 or more insect fragments for every 100 grams to be left in this
allowance carries over to all nut butters i think there might be some kind of conspiracy it seems
as though it's impossible for them to keep out all of the insects which might find their way into the
nuts before the nuts get ground again if this idea turns your stomach but the idea of going without
nut butter makes you want to cry you can invest in a nut grinding machine of your very own so you can
examine your nuts before tossing them into your grinder this is something that can actually be
useful to you especially if you're a vegan as nut butters are a mainstay of your diet and the bugs
that accompany the ones in the jars render your nut butter non-vegan chocolate and candy chocolate
the fda allows for 74 insect pieces in an average 4.4 ounce chocolate bar taro estimates that
chocoholics might be consuming approximately 6 000 insect fragments via chocolate every year
the average chocolate bar in the united states has approximately eight insect pieces within it cacao
beans are harvested in the tropical countries of south america where there are low sanitation
levels and several general troubles related to their water quality the cacao tree beans are cut
and then they're piled in the farmer's fields where they ferment for approximately six days
similar to the coffee beans we've discussed during that time both adults and children step onto the
piles and insects and rodents small animals and other living things build their nests within the
piles so it's very possible that there are insect materials finding their way into your favorite
chocolate bars the same thing that happens with coffee beans can happen with chocolate
beans people who are allergic to chocolate may truly be allergic to cockroaches instead
stop eating it then oh cause i'm allergic to it as for candy the crunchy candy coating is
usually made from secretions from the female lack bug sometimes it is called confectioner's glaze
sometimes it's called shellac shellac has many uses the candy coating makes sweets look shiny
and it's also used as a brush on colorant as for red candies such as skittles or swedish fish
they are coated with red food colorant made from the crushed abdomens of african female beetle-like
insects the official name of the colorant is dactylopius caucus vegans and vegetarians
need to be enlightened pasta give me pizza give me pasta give me lots of cannoli yes the fda allows
approximately 225 insect fragments for every 225 grams of pasta if there's more the pasta
product will be banned from the grocery store shelves that's about one bug part for every gram
the insects find their way into the pasta through the wheat which itself
can have about 75 insect parts for every 50 grams raisins hey hey remember ghostbusters
in a simple cup of raisins there could be up to 35 fruit fly eggs and 10 whole insects according
to the fda guidelines they won't harm you when you consume them the fda allows for a small amount of
insect material that is guaranteed safe for humans to consume to transfer into our food
it's suspected that it would just plainly cost way too much to try to eliminate all defects from food
production another reason to hate broccoli it's broccoli aphids are tiny bugs that usually grow
to approximately two to five millimeters in size they also happen to make up about 10 percent of
the world's consumed insects what aphids are well known for doing is infesting gardens and
crop fields that grow vegetables like broccoli the fda allows about 60 aphids for every 100 grams of
frozen broccoli just in case you needed another excuse not to eat the broccoli on your plate
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