Coffee, chocolate, and contaminents

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So I was listening to Terry Gross on NPR interview this professor who was talking about dung beetles and bugs and stuff. He won't use any kind of insecticide because of fear of side effects, and mentions that most others in his field also like most insects except for maybe cockroaches. He will squash spiders because some bite and he has small children at home. As far as ants and stuff, live and let live. He told a story about traveling with an expert in his field one time out west, and how they had to drive far off the interstate to satisfy this guy's caffeine addiction. Seems the guy was very allergic to cockroaches, and he couldn't drink pre-ground due to the amount of insect parts it contained. He would have a reaction. Seems that they have these huge piles of coffee beans where they grind them and there is no way to keep out the roaches. It took him a while to figure out where he was getting exposed to roaches, but when he started drinking freshly ground coffee he had no problem. In those days there weren't Starbucks store all over the place, and they often had to drive for a considerable distance off the expressway to find a place that had good coffee, freshly ground and free of insect parts. He said the same thing is true of chocolate. Some even think allergies to roaches have a role in causing asthma. I don't know how they avoid the roaches in the whole bean product...
Food for thought, so to speak.
 
Don't worry, the FDA has imposed strict limits on insect content in consumables.
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Before I retired "2000" from fixing forklifts the company I worked for had Guittards Chocolate for an account for many years the plant and warehouse was kept spotless and sanitary. You could eat off of any surface from floor to ceiling no dirt no bugs no animals,absolute top quality. Cleanliness depends upon the quality of acompanys standards.
 
I thought roaches were fast normally. Can you imagine how fast they skitter after feeding in a big pile of coffee beans?
 
Here's Apple Butter's...
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APPLE BUTTER Mold
(AOAC 975.51) Average of mold count is 12% or more
Rodent filth
(AOAC 945.76) Average of 4 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams of apple butter
Insects
(AOAC 945.76) Average of 5 or more whole or equivalent insects (not counting mites, aphids, thrips, or scale insects) per 100 grams of apple butter

DEFECT SOURCE: Mold - post harvest infection. Rodent hair - post harvest and/or processing contamination with animal hair. Whole or equivalent insects - preharvest, and/or post harvest and/or processing insect infestation,
SIGNIFICANCE: Aesthetic
 
Here's the coffee beans...

COFFEE BEANS, GREEN Insect filth and insects
(MPM-V1) Average 10% or more by count are insect-infested or insect-damaged
Note:
If live external infestation is present use the Compliance Policy Guide (CPG) titled "Food Storage and Warehousing-Adulteration-Filth" (CPG 580.100) in accordance with "Interpretation of Insect Filth" (CPG 555.600)
Mold
(MPM-V1) Average of 10% or more beans by count are moldy
 
Here's the beloved chocolate...

CHOCOLATE AND CHOCOLATE LIQUOR Insect filth
(AOAC 965.38) Average is 60 or more insect fragments per 100 grams when 6 100-gram subsamples are examined
OR
Any 1 subsample contains 90 or more insect fragments
Rodent filth
(AOAC 965.38) Average is 1 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams in 6 100-gram subsamples examined
OR
Any 1 subsample contains 3 or more rodent hairs
Shell
(AOAC 968.10-970.23) For chocolate liquor, if the shell is in excess of 2% calculated on the basis of alkali-free nibs

DEFECT SOURCE: Insect fragments - post harvest and/or processing insect infestation, Rodent hair - post harvest and/or processing contamination with animal hair or excreta, Shell - processing contamination
SIGNIFICANCE: Aesthetic
 
I worked with a guy once that had a previous job in the food processing industry. One product they packaged was raisins.

Seems a shipment had turned up on the dock with too high a level of bugs in it. The inspectors turned it down, so it was shipped out of the country to another jurisdiction where the tolerances were looser. Well, by the time it got there, the little critters had been busy, so it had too many bugs for them, too. So what did they do? Shipped it back to the first location, mixed it with a clean shipment with almost no contamination, measured the now "lower bug level" which finally met the government standard, and put it into packages and whisked it off to food stores before it started to move on its own.
 
Nice...an example of where specification citing only an average value suck!! I've been in food plants and storage facilities where the number of feces on the floor outnumbers the employees! Their answer to insect infestation was to take all the boxes of product and rapidly throw them into a huge freezer to kill the viable bugs and hopefully sort them out later!! All and all everything in moderation I suppose. I still laugh at the fact that the standards in the defect action level handbook haven't been updated since the 70's-even with the advent of new harvesting practices and vastly improved automated inspection technology.
 
Originally Posted By: pickled
I still laugh at the fact that the standards in the defect action level handbook haven't been updated since the 70's-even with the advent of new harvesting practices and vastly improved automated inspection technology.


That would stifle the free enterprise.
 
Originally Posted By: jaj

Seems a shipment had turned up on the dock with too high a level of bugs in it. The inspectors turned it down, so it was shipped out of the country to another jurisdiction where the tolerances were looser. Well, by the time it got there, the little critters had been busy, so it had too many bugs for them, too. So what did they do? Shipped it back to the first location, mixed it with a clean shipment with almost no contamination, measured the now "lower bug level" which finally met the government standard, and put it into packages and whisked it off to food stores before it started to move on its own.




Didn't you get the memo? Dilution is the solution to pollution!
 
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