Several years back, I was a big fan of the children’s educational science show called Beakman’s World (it was much better than Bill Nye the Science Guy, in my opinion). I remember one episode where a reader mailed in to ask a question regarding the ingredients of luncheon meat (e.g. Spam). IIRC, Beakman actually claimed that maggots somehow get into the meat. Next time we opened up a can of luncheon meat, I examined it, and sure enough, I saw little white bits in it. :eek: I’m not saying they were maggots, but I was a kid…
I hated creepy crawlies and still do, so I found this completely disgusting. So what happened there?
a) Beakman was right.
b) I didn’t hear him right or I imagined the whole thing.
c) Beakman was wrong.
True. However, they’re probably dead. And chopped up. And then cooked. The US FDA does allow a certain amount of insect parts, animal hairs and other unsavory items into processed foods, though this amount is normally so small so as to be almost unnoticeable. Most packaged meat products are fully cooked (which would kill any nasties) and are packaged hot to prevent the growth of bacteria. So, yeah, you’re probably eating things you don’t want to know about it, but it’s not going to hurt you.
If Beakman meant that maggots occasionally got into luncheon meat, I would be fine with it for the most part, but I remember while he was explaining it, there was a fullscreen videoclip showing several live maggots in processed meat.
So one or two in a can I can tolerate, but how many maggots do end up in an average can of the stuff? Does it get crazy, like 10 maggots in a can?
Strangely, I don’t remember him mentioning other insects, so to my young self, it sounded like he was saying that there was an unusually high number of maggots that end up in luncheon meat compared to, say, hotdogs.
I hope my confusion can be blamed on bad program editing (ugh, that video they showed!) and poorly chosen words for Beakman’s explanation.
Luncheon meat is cooked in the can after it is sealed (that’s why it lasts unrefrigerated for years) - there’s no way live maggots would be found in the processed product.
There may be insect parts in foods, but not live insects in canned products.
The white bits would be fat. Sure, there may be a couple of fragments of creepy crawlies there, but what are maggots made out of if not meat? Time once again to invoke my mother’s theory that bugs that have lived their life on one foodstuff have to be about 99% made of that foodstuff. She told me that one if I found a bug on a raspberry or something like that, but I guess it works with maggots…
Other possibilities for the white bits are cartilage or connective tissue; the reason that luncheon meat is so finely-textured is that it is made from the bits you wouldn’t normally eat if they were plonked whole on a plate.
The white specs you see in canned luncheon meat are bits of fat.
Maggots are fly larvae and an open can of luncheon meat left open on the counter and more in particular outdoors where flies have access will develop larvae in a day or so. Makes an intersting experiment to see the results.
An educational exercise would be for you to search the web for more information on flies, their life cycle, and maggots.
This is very likely the subject of the episode of Beakman’s World the OP is referring to. Never saw it myself, but it sounds like the sort of edgy, real-world experiment he’d do on his show.
Speaking of which, I have a can of Cheese Spam, which has been aging like fine wine in my cabinet for about two years. I think it’s about time I plan a weekend with a loaf of bread, a can of Cheese Spam, and mayo. (I think I’ll opt for some movies to watch instead of a book of verses underneath the bough, though.)
I just wanted to mention that I actually wrote a letter to Beakman; he never answered it on the show but I got a postcard back. And I wholeheartedly agree that Beakman’s World was much, much better than that hack Bill Nye.
Other than that, I have nothing further to contribute .
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