You can probably find critters in most food if you look hard enough. (It’s a good idea to freeze things like flour, grains, for a few days after buying. It nips a lot of little life in the ‘bud’ before you see it.)
Yes, we freeze flour and corn meal to kill the eggs...............
1-3% of our body weight is living microbes.
“You can probably find critters in most food if you look hard enough”
There are actual FDA guidelines for many food products listing allowable % of critter parts and content in the packaging.
And that aside from the push for Bugs as Food.
Exactly, anything with flour certainly has dead critters and quite possibly live critters at least in the form of eggs if there isnt something actually burrowing around.
I remember a cheap brand of boxed macaroni and cheese from the 70s that people always peppered way too much because doing so disguised the bug eyes. I didnt really like that kind, that other cheap brand with the dried green mold in its cheese powder tasted much better and you could pretend that the green pieces were vegetables which seemed to make it more healthy.
It still happens and I dont think most people recognize it because of the disgusting cuisines that have become so common disguise these things better and a good part of that is the fact that everything has to be so over spiced that you cant really taste what you are eating anymore let alone see a bare spot on your food.
MrsMaw and I went to a supper club a few years ago. A bowl of soup came with the meal and we both ordered chicken dumpling. It was quite popular, nearly everyone was eating some. I was the first to notice that those spots werent pepper. I tried to be quiet as I returned the bowls for some salads but some others wound up sending theirs back then too.
In retrospect, I dont remember checking my salad for caterpillars or frogs.
That being said, I ain't touching tilapia or anything from a Chinese food operation. I may be crazy, but endeavor to avoid stupid (and persevere).