Gross
Things Found
in Food
In honor of the
finger in the
Wendy's chili
being declared a
hoax by the
police, here's a
round-up of some
gross things
that have been
found in food by
restaurant
patrons
(including the
recent Wendy's
incident). Three
of these
complaints
actually turned
out to be
legitimate:Phony Finger: In January 1987 two men in California informed police that they had found a human finger in a can of Juanita's Menudo soup. The 'finger' turned out to be a piece of tripe (which is the muscular lining of beef stomach) carved to look like a finger. The men had placed the object in the soup themselves.
Chicken
McNoggin: On
the night of
November 27,
2000 a woman in
Newport, News
Virginia bought
a box of chicken
wings at a local
McDonalds (the
store was
test-marketing
fried chicken
wings). Upon
taking the meal
home, she
discovered an
unpleasant
surprise: a
breaded, fried
chicken head was
included with
the wings. She
immediately
contacted the
media and a
lawyer.
Reporters who
examined the
head said that
the batter on it
did look exactly
like the batter
on the wings, so
it didn't seem
to be something
she had created
herself. However
the woman
refused to turn
the head over to
McDonalds for
examination.
Whether she ever
did sue the
company, I don't
know. Lawyers
doubted she
would have
received much in
the way of a
settlement,
since she found
the head before
biting down into
it.Clam Condom: In Feb. 2002 a woman was eating a bowl of clam chowder at a McCormick and Schmick's seafood restaurant in Irvine, CA when she bit down on something rubbery. She thought it was a piece of calamari, but when she spit it out into her napkin she discovered that it was a condom. She immediately complained and the restaurant manager took the condom from her. The woman later sued and won an undisclosed settlement from the restaurant. The restaurant itself tried to sue the supplier of the clam chowder, but a judge ruled in favor of the supplier.
Fried Mouse:
In September
2003 a man was
eating a
three-piece
combo meal at a
Popeye's Fried
Chicken in
Baltimore when
he bit down into
a deep-fried
mouse that had
somehow gotten
lodged in
between the skin
and the meat of
the chicken.
Police said that
the complaint
seemed to be
legitimate. That
restaurant had
been cited for
rodent
infestations in
the past.Soup Mouse: A woman and her son were eating at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in May 2004 when the woman found a mouse in her bowl of vegetable soup. She immediately began screaming, prompting many of the other restaurant patrons to leave. While it investigated the incident, Cracker Barrel stopped serving vegetable soup at all 497 of its restaurants nationwide. Police eventually concluded that the woman had placed the mouse in the soup herself in an attempt to extort money from the restaurant. An autopsy had shown that the mouse had died from a skull fracture, not from drowning in soup.
Fried Baby Foot: In July 2004 a family in Durham, North Carolina found what appeared to be a breaded, fried baby's foot in their frozen chicken dinner bought at a local supermarket. The police later identified the object as a piece of dough that a prankster had shaped to look like a baby's foot. The police concluded that tampering took place before the frozen chicken pieces arrived at the supermarket.
Chili Finger:
In March 2005
Anna Ayala sat
down to eat a
bowl of Chili at
a Wendy's
restaurant in
California but
encountered an
unpleasant
surprise. She
bit down on
something hard,
spit it out, and
discovered that
it was a human
finger. She
claims that she
then began
vomiting.
Wendy's launched
an internal
investigation,
but couldn't
identify anyone
involved in the
preparation of
the food who was
missing a
finger. The
company also
offered a
$100,000 reward
for any
information
about how the
finger could
have gotten into
the chili.
Meanwhile the
police launched
their own
investigation,
and a month
later arrested
Ayala herself
after concluding
that she was the
one who put the
finger in the
chili. Wendy's
is filing
charges against
her. However,
the police have
yet to locate
where the finger
actually came
from.
