A mum says she won't shop at Asda again after finding fish eggs in a teatime treat she bought for her son at the supermarket.
Caitlyn Lawton, 19, made the unpleasant discovery after cooking the fish fingers from Asda's Just Essential range for two-year-old son Austin. She noticed the fishy discovery just before she dished up the meal, Chronicle Live reports, and said the encounter has left her anxious about buying the product again.
She recalled: "It was disgusting. I had cooked the fish fingers and my partner got the tray out, cut them up and put them on the windowsill to cool down.
"I got the tray out to give them to him and noticed all these little balls and thought it wasn't right. I cut them up again and realised it was lots of fish eggs."
Caitlyn, from Cramlington, near Newcastle, said it was lucky she noticed the eggs before her little boy took a bite. She has now vowed to never shop at Asda again.
She said: "I have really bad health anxiety and this would have pushed me over the edge. If he had ate them I would probably have taken him to hospital.
She said: "I'm never going to shop there again. I do my shopping on a Friday and went to a different shop."
It's not the first time that fish eggs have been found in the budget fish fingers. Earlier this week, the Mirror reported on Middlesborough mum Chelsea Freer, who also found roe in the frozen sticks she bought for her son.
It comes after the Mirror reported a mum from Middlesbrough found fish eggs in fish fingers she was going to feed her two-year-old. Roe is safe to eat – and its more expensive form from sturgeon fish, caviar, is considered a delicacy – but it is not commonly eaten in the UK.
An Asda spokesman said: "Unfortunately the nature of using fish means that there is always a small risk of roe making its way into the final product. We have processes in place throughout the supply chain from catch to processing, including avoiding times of the year when this is more likely occur.
"We've contacted Ms Lawton and offered her a full refund as well as a gesture of goodwill, and we apologise again for any inconvenience this may have caused her."
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