Woman's disturbing find in Woolworths pasta sauce
Woolworths is “very concerned” after a customer found a maggot in her pasta sauce product.
On Wednesday, the customer shared a picture of her 500g Raguletto Venetian sauce to Woolworths’ Facebook page.
The picture shows what appears to be a maggot sitting near the top of the glass jar.
She said she bought the product from a store in Revesby, Sydney.
“Just found this on my jar after opening it,” the woman wrote.
“I actually used the jar before noticing so had to throw the whole pot of food out, such a waste.”
Woolworths replied to the woman’s Facebook post, asking for her contact details and the product details such as the use by date and batch info.
“We're very concerned about this … and take incidents like this very seriously,” the supermarket wrote.
Simplot Australia, manufacturer of Raguletto, has denied that the contamination came from their end.
“Our internal checks confirmed the original response by Woolworths that the insect is most likely a pantry moth larvae,” the company’s spokesperson told Yahoo! News Australia.
“The larvae generally come from dry products and we recommend consumers check any dry products in their pantry to ensure they are also free of contamination. Pantry moths often lay eggs under the outside rim of container lids.”
According to the company, the pasta sauce product is heat-treated during production to create a vacuum seal which would prevent a live larvae from surviving.
The spokesperson said: “Simplot holds itself to the highest quality and food safety standards, by complying to internationally accredited practices.”
The Raguletto Venetian sauce is also sold at Coles and IGA.