Kirkcaldy Aldi store blasted after larvae in ready meal 'traumatises' teenager

John McNeil who lives in the Lang Toun purchased the Oakhurst BBQ Pulled Pork meal from Aldi on Ferrard Street in December before serving it up to his daughter Gabriella. After eating most of the meal, she discovered the yellow-white insect on her plate amongst the meat.

John explained: “She strangely enough doesn't like to mix her food, so the pork was on a plate on its own. There was no salad or any other accompanying food product, the chips were on a separate plate. After getting through most of the pork, she noticed this larvae type insect, which was dead.”

John said he wanted to let Aldi know that there had been an issue with the processes to ensure that it did not happen again.

He said: “I contacted Aldi out of concern and also to let them know that there's been a flaw in their quality assurance.”

John said that the incident has left Gabriella unable to eat meat and that the supermarket has not taken full responsibility for the incident, leaving him frustrated with its response to the incident.

He explained: “The core issue is that there was an insect. Accept the responsibility and make some kind of amends for the distress that has been caused.”

John was initially offered a refund on the product, before the supermarket upped its offer to £50. However, John said his complaint is not about the money and rather about the way in which the complaint was handled. He said: “We spend £800 a month in Aldi I've got a teenage daughter whose stomach has now turned when it comes to meat.’”

After further discussing the issue with the supermarket’s customer service team, John said that the company laid the blame at the feet of a supplier. In email’s between John and Aldi’s customer service team, the supermarket has highlighted that a pest control company contacted by the supplier has identified the larvae as appearing “to be the larva of a species of moth” – but without having a physical sample they were “unable to state the species, genus or family.”

An Aldi spokesperson said: “Although very rare, incidents like this can occur if packaging is damaged at any point before the product is consumed. We apologise to Mr O’Neil that this product didn’t meet our usual high standards.”

It is thought that the most likely source of the for incidents of this nature is accidental damage to packaging before the product is consumed, either in transport or storage. The supplier has not received any other complaints of this nature in relation to this product.