Ugh, sometimes I hate cooking from fresh produce.

I was making a vegetable soup today with potatoes, carrots, peas… and I was planning on including a cauliflower, too. Once I started peeling it, I noticed several bright green caterpillars wriggling around. There were also a couple in cocoons. I thought, “alright, I’ll rinse them off and see how it looks.” Then I started noticing tiny little caterpillar toilet areas all around the nice white cauliflower… The whole thing flew quickly to the trash. Brrr.

Cabbages and those sorts are probably the worst: there are so many little nooks and crannies for bugs to hide in.

When my godson was younger, I used to look after my aunt’s kids (i.e. my godson and his sister) every summer. I’d also cook for them. One summer they had a little patch of vegetables in the yard so I was asked to make a salad with some home-grown lettuce and carrots. I tried to pick out the cleanest-looking lettuce but peeling away the layers uncovered a nice surprise: two or three slugs. (The thought still gives me shivers.) Slugs are even worse than caterpillars which are kinda cute (as long as they’re not cooked, seasoned, and on my plate).

Luckily I happened to have some frozen broccoli so I used that instead of the cauliflower. I know there can be all sorts of things hidden in packaged foods (mice, crickets, beetles, lizards… just to name but a few from recent news; I also once found a feather in a nut mix) but at least I didn’t see anything!