Mouse or mince? Pie eater gets nasty surprise

  • Breaking
  • 27/03/2008

It is not what you would expect to find when chowing down on your favourite steak and cheese pie.

John Rutherford got a nasty surprise when he bit into his: “I had two bites of my pie and the dog jumped up and I looked at it and saw hairs sticking out and soon found it was a mouse.”

Rutherford says he had already polished off one pie and was starting on another, when the dog jumped up, and he noticed what appeared to be a tail poking out from the meat.

The pies were purchased from this countdown supermarket in Dunedin. They were in a frozen pack of eight, and all the rest were eaten before Rutherford stumbled upon his lucky dip.

With churning bellies, Rutherford and his friend took the pie to Public Health South to be tested.

“As soon as he saw the pie he said he was 99% sure it was a mouse just on sight,” says Rutherford.

However, there was a different reaction from Public Health South today: “The item in the pie has not been confirmed to be a rodent and we suspect it could be something like a piece of animal skin with hair on it.”

But Rutherford disagrees: “Both me and Shawn have worked at the meat works and both identified it as not a piece of gristle.”

The Irvines range of pies are owned by GoodmanFielder, one of the largest food distributors in the country. And while they doubt the extra ingredient was a mouse, the say: "For people to buy a product they have to have confidence in it and if they lose that we lose them. We will be reviewing all procedures.”

They believe it is a product quality issue, not a health issue and will therefore not be removing the pies from the shelf.

As for Rutherford, his daily diet may never be the same.

“I don't think I'll be eating a pie anytime soon,” he says.

Test results are expected back in two weeks and will reveal whether the secret ingredient was indeed mouse, or just mince.

 

source: newshub archive