'Claws and everything!': Grandmother's shock at finding 'whole scorpion' packaged in M&S anchovies
'If a scorpion can get into the food preparation, what else can get in?' Ms Rios told LBC after making the discovery
A British grandmother has been left "absolutely shocked" after discovering a dead scorpion curled up in a pack of M&S anchovies.
Listen to this article
Patricia Rios purchased the Spanish marinated anchovies with white wine vinegar at the M&S Food outlet at Gatwick airport on Friday afternoon.
But on Saturday, as she went to tip the pack into a salad she was preparing for her grandsons' lunch, she spotted something unusual.
"When I opened it, I noticed there was something brown in it curled up," Patricia told LBC. "Because the anchovies are blanched and all white, this really stood out. And I thought, oh, that didn't look quite right."
Her son-in-law took the offending item out to inspect it, and they realised, to their horror, that it was a "whole scorpion."
"We just couldn't believe it. It was all intact, you know, the whole thing with the tail and the claws and everything... everything went through my mind. I thought, what if it's alive?"
Read more: 'All-British’ fighter jet forced to use American engine after Rolls-Royce-BAE Systems bust-up
Patricia put the scorpion back in the package and sealed it in a Tupperware, before storing it in the fridge out in the garage, because she "can't face it in the kitchen."
She alerted M&S "immediately," hoping the item would be taken off shelves to prevent other customers from getting a nasty surprise if the incident isn't a one-off. But she says "nothing was really done" after she supplied the company with the product bar-code as requested.
"I'm just hoping that Marks and Spencer will collect it or ask me to deliver it into the store and they could further examine, establish, and explain to me how this got into their food production," she says.
"Because surely they have pest control programmes and hygiene checks with any kind of contamination event. And this is clearly quite a serious one."
A spokesperson for M&S told LBC: “We take the quality of our products incredibly seriously and immediately began investigating this matter. Our customer service team are in contact with the customer to keep them updated.”
The package says the product was "made in the UK with anchovies caught in the Cantabrian Sea," which is off the Spanish coast.
The family had been returning from their annual holiday in Spain when Patricia bought the anchovies. She planned to serve them to her grandsons Jack, 7, and Flynn, 11, after they had developed a taste for the little fish during the trip.
"They have lovely anchovies out there and the boys absolutely loved it... so when we landed and I saw this and I thought, oh, it'd be lovely to have it again for our.. lunch on Saturday," she said.
The discovery that packaged food she had bought had been contaminated was especially alarming for Patricia because Flynn has a severe nut allergy.
"We're very careful when we shop for Flynn, we check everything, we look at all the ingredients. But now you do begin to wonder, if a scorpion can get into the food preparation, what else can get in?
"I shop [at M&S] often because I know it's a little bit more expensive, but I think the food quality is better, and you think that their hygiene [is also better]. But clearly after experiencing this, I'm not so convinced anymore."
She says she has lost confidence in the supermarket's "food supply and preparation," and will "probably be shopping there less."