Barilla Complaint - BUGS in my pasta! - Barilla Ricotta & Spinach Tortellini

Posted by Sparticus on 2007-06-05:

I think those boxes of pasta are not completely sealed right? Just in cardboard boxes? If that is the case, I would imagine small insects could get in the box from the store warehouse or even while on the shelves... If the box was airtight... odds are the bugs would not have survived... or at least that would be my guess. I'd be steering clear of that Walmart...

Posted by heaven17 on 2007-06-05:

I hate to admit this, but I bought some Rice-A-Roni from a local convenience store once and it had several bugs in it.
I picked them out and ate the stuff anyway!
Hey, when you want the Roni...

That's my Gross-You-Out Moment for the day!

Posted by CrystalSword on 2007-06-05:

If anything sits on the shelf long enough its bound to have weavels hatch out. Flour is a good example...I bring it home and freeze it for a few days before I put it in the canister. Cake mixes, even though sealed in plastic inside the box, can have weavels. They won't hurt you, they are just a fact of life. Besides, its free protein!

Posted by Lidman on 2007-06-05:

Crystal, I get my protein from the little ants that sometimes get is my coffie. lol
Rekico, good review and I am sure one of our members will love to here that his beloved Barilla's is not as great as he thought. I voted you most helpfull, thanks for the infomation

Posted by spiderman2 on 2007-06-05:

That is gross! What did Barilla say?

Posted by Sarah May on 2007-06-05:

Pardon my girly moment here, but... YUCKY!! UCKY YUCKY YUCKY EWWW!! I hope you managed to stomach something for dinner after that. Thanks for the review.

Posted by *Brenda* on 2007-06-05:

Sparticus, this pasta comes in bags. So.. I guess either there was a hole or they got in before packaging. Eww!

Posted by adzidek on 2007-06-05:

Sarah May, I'm a fairly strong-stomached dude, definitely not girly, and I second your "YUCKY!! UCKY YUCKY YUCKY EWWW!!".

I probably won't be eating pasta for a while. Or flour, thanks to Crystal!! Thanks a lot !! (joking).

Posted by Starlord on 2007-06-05:

Our daughter refuses to use ketchup because someone told her the FDA allows a certain amount of insect parts in it. She seemmingly doesn't accept that the FDA allows a certain amount of insect parts in ALL foods. It's a fact of life. You could never elimiante all insect parts in food, and if you could, no one could afford to eat. In many countries in the world (including one place in Southern California) many people eat many insects, and consider what we eat to be disgusting. Many products, like pasta, flour bread, etc due to the packaging, cannot prevent the entry of tiny insects. To make it through distribution, the packages would have to be hermetically sealed, which would be very expensive and would promote mold growth. I'd rather eat the bugs than mold, thank you.

Posted by Sarah May on 2007-06-05:

starlord, I wonder if she's referring to the coloring that's used in a lot of foods which is essentially ground up bug? I believe it can be read about in Fast Food Nation, which I personally haven't gotten to yet but my fiancé just finished and abridged for me. :)

Posted by Rekico on 2007-06-06:

Well, in terms of my stomach's sanity, I can handle eating things that might contain something I don't want to know about, as long as I can't see them. But when my normally light colored soft pasta has crunchy bugs and insect eggs in it, I can't stomach that. I'm not totally queamish. In fact, my favorite food is sushi. I just can't make myself enjoy pasta when I'm looking at the bugs I'm consuming at the same time.

Posted by Sarah May on 2007-06-06:

Heck no, I'm with you there Rekico! And unless they've got a picture on the packaging of pasta with bugs on it, I'd say you didn't get what you paid for.

Posted by Skye on 2007-06-06:

It's gross, but those bugs are weevils, and they are from flour, and yes, they can be in unopened foods, like pasta, cereal, flour. Keep those types of foods in the freezer. Just google it, and it's a very common thing to find these types of bugs in unopened food.

Posted by ayayla on 2007-06-10:

Well I got the same thing. In a Barilla Rigatoni box I got 3-4 for pastas infected! The bugs were inside the pasta as if they were caught there during the process. I needed to break the pasta to take them out!

Posted by msmom on 2007-06-19:

Do any of you have birds in the house? I never ever had problems with any kind of bugs in my pantry until my daughter got a parrot! We had such a moth problem and now I am seeing these weevil things in the pasta boxes! They are alive too! While researching ways to get rid of the moths I read that bird food is very likely to have eggs in it because of the cautions that are taken in processing their food without pesticides. It is recommended that you freeze their food after purchasing. I have found that doing this along with putting a moth trap in the pantry has greatly helped the moth problem. I just hope that it will have some possitive effect on getting rid of these weevils as well.

Posted by lockwood on 2007-07-22:

I think BArilla should pay you something. The same thing happened to me except my was WASA bread. I don't know where some of these people come from on this posting but in this culture, bugs are not normally used as food. I am just curious about how the processing procedures go or do they just not care. This food comes from a foreign nations, Italy and Sweden.

Posted by risa on 2007-08-19:

Just wanted to add that i dont believe its Barilla, only because EVERY time i have bought pasta in Walmart recently there has been bugs in it no matter what brand i have bought, so i do very mush beleive its the store you get it from. because when i go to the regular grocery store and nuy pasta i have no bugs in it and its the same brands i was buying at walmart.

Posted by Barbara on 2012-06-26:

Barilla Pasta -- had boiling water in a pot on stove, opened the box of Barilla pasta and dumped it into the water...saw bugs floating on top. It was disgusting! Got another box of Barilla out of the Pantry and it had bugs, another box of Barilla did not. These were all recently bought and were unopened. They were NOT bought at Walmart, they were bought at BJ's. I think it's Barilla...obviously they have bugs in their plant. I will be contacting Barilla and BJ's for a refund and I will never buy Barilla again.