Civet coffee (Kopi Luwak)......anyone?

[Still Waters]

Here's a picture gallery for the strong of stomach only. You've been warned - it may cause you to spit your coffee out all over your computer monitor...

Link/Pics

[Kissmet]

NO way I know what civet coffee is Should really be named civet dung.

[SilverCougar]

Well.. if it saves having to dehusk the coffee..

[Lt_Ripley]

it's supposed to be great coffee ! I'd love to try some. it's sterilized .

some of the things you eat and drink everyday if you knew would make you queasy. We in the US have standards about how much insect matter can be found in canned foods. Apple juice, pasteurized yes ... with worms ? yes. They get crushed too.

Discovering what's really in the food you eat can be depressing. You've surely heard that Americans eat as much as two pounds of insects per year without knowing it. But that seems pretty benign compared with the other stuff you may be ingesting. Pesticides, rodent droppings, way more fat than you had ever imagined... Fortunately there are web resources to scare you / gross you out / educate you about what you're throwing down the hatch. This new information may not keep you from your favorite greasy spoon — nor should it — but it may help you choose some healthier or more sanitary options for your general snacking and dining

How Many Insect Parts and Rodent Hairs are Allowed in Your Food?

More Than You Think ... and Maybe Than You Want to Know!

by www.SixWise.com

How about a little rat hair with your peanut butter? A fly head with your macaroni and cheese? Though it may sound disgusting, these things and other gross filth the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) calls "natural contaminants" are indeed allowed and present in your food.

In fact, so common are these contaminants that the FDA has published a booklet detailing the so-called "Food Defect Action Levels," which were needed, according to the FDA, " ... because it is economically impractical to grow, harvest, or process raw products that are totally free of non-hazardous, naturally occurring, unavoidable defects."

Surely, anyone who's ever collected lettuce from a home garden, picked apples right from the tree or strawberries right from the vine has gotten the unpleasant surprise of finding a spider, worm or other "natural contaminant" in their harvest. But in these cases, we're more accepting, or at least, more expecting, of finding an unwanted guest, and we're free to inspect each item for ourselves.

But what about when it comes to processed foods? Is there really any way to know how many insect parts have been ground right up with the rest of the ingredients? Probably not.

Think insect parts and rodent hairs are more of a rarity? Think again. An Ohio University fact sheet estimates that we eat from one to two pounds of insects each year, and without knowing it.

This is Gross, but is it Dangerous?

Quite the contrary. "They're actually pretty healthy," says Dr. Philip Nixon, an entomologist at the University of Illinois, in regard to insects, "If we were more willing to accept certain defect levels such as insects and insect parts, growers could reduce pesticide usage. Some of the spraying that goes on is directly related to the aesthetics of our food."

The FDA agrees that it's reasonable to accept more natural defects in our food in lieu of increasing the amount of pesticides sprayed on them:

"The alternative to establishing natural defect levels in some foods would be to insist on increased utilization of chemical substances to control insects, rodents and other natural contaminants. The alternative is not satisfactory because of the very real danger of exposing consumers to potential hazards from residues of these chemicals, as opposed to the aesthetically unpleasant but harmless natural and unavoidable defects."

However, there may be one health area that's been overlooked. According to Judy Tidwell, an economic service specialist at a state social services office in the Southeast United States who has struggled with allergies, trace amounts of insect parts that have been ground into food items ranging from strawberry jam to spaghetti sauce can affect people with allergies and asthma.

"We throw away the products that we see are infested. Just think how many we consume because we didn't notice they were infested. Ingesting insect material may cause stomach disorders, as well as allergic reactions," she says.

How Many Rodent Hairs and Insect Parts Are In ...

Peanut Butter

The FDA's action level for peanut butter is 30 or more insect fragments or one or more rodent hairs per 100 grams.

Here is a very brief sampling of the FDA's Food Defect Action Level list. They begin investigation when foods reach the action level they've set. According to the FDA, typical foods contain about 10 percent of the action level, but others say they contain more like 40 percent.

CHOCOLATE AND CHOCOLATE LIQUOR

*

Insect filth: Average is 60 or more insect fragments per 100 grams when 6 100-gram subsamples are examined OR any 1 subsample contains 90 or more insect fragments

*

Rodent filth: Average is 1 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams in 6 100-gram subsamples examined OR any 1 subsample contains 3 or more rodent hairs

CITRUS FRUIT JUICES, CANNED

*

Insects and insect eggs: 5 or more Drosophila and other fly eggs per 250 ml or 1 or more maggots per 250 ml

RED FISH AND OCEAN PERCH

*

Parasites: 3% of the fillets examined contain 1 or more parasites accompanied by pus pockets

MACARONI AND NOODLE PRODUCTS

*

Insect filth: Average of 225 insect fragments or more per 225 grams in 6 or more subsamples

*

Rodent filth: Average of 4.5 rodent hairs or more per 225 grams in 6 or more subsamples

PEANUT BUTTER

*

Insect filth: Average of 30 or more insect fragments per 100 grams

*

Rodent filth: Average of 1 or more rodent hairs per 100 grams

POPCORN

*

Rodent filth: 1 or more rodent excreta pellets are found in 1 or more subsamples, and 1 or more rodent hairs are found in 2 or more other subsamples OR 2 or more rodent hairs per pound and rodent hair is found in 50% or more of the subsamples OR 20 or more gnawed grains per pound and rodent hair is found in 50% or more of the subsamples

WHEAT FLOUR

*

Insect filth: Average of 75 or more insect fragments per 50 grams

*

Rodent filth: Average of 1 or more rodent hairs per 50 grams

Can these things be avoided? To avoid all unsavory food components, it seems, would be to stop eating all together. And perhaps we're just being too squeamish. After all, as Dr. Manfred Kroger, a professor of food science at Pennsylvania State University, says, "Let's face it, much of our food comes from nature, and nature is not perfect."

http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/05/06/2...n_your_food.htm

shudder

[Cetacea]

Apparently Stephen Fry gave Charles and Camilla something similar, weasel coffee as a wedding present...

[schizoidwoman]

Apparently Stephen Fry gave Charles and Camilla something similar, weasel coffee as a wedding present...

My sister gave my brother weasel coffee for Christmas two years ago, he reports it was delicious!

[Hissie Sola]

The package does make it sound rather attractive.... "unique delicate flavour after fermentation in the civet's digestive tract!"..... now that's good advertising!

[BiffSplitkins]

Those little Civets must be super jacked all the time.

[ravergirl]

Coffee and poo go hand in hand. Anyone who has a morning cup knows this....All they have done is consolidated time by having the coffee come from poo, thus saving you an average of 15 min a day. That is about 5500 min a year of extra sleep despite the excess levels of caffeine...giving you the option of staying awake all the way through Letterman. isn't that great!!!

[MissMelsWell]

Civet coffee is a gimmick... people are lured into thinking it's good because it's expensive and difficult to "harvest" shall we say.

The problem is that civet coffee is robusta coffee, not the good arabica coffee we all like. Robusta coffee is robusta coffee and not good no matter how many kitties pooped it. The makers of civet coffee insist that it's low acid and this is suppose to be the appeal. Ok, but robusta coffee is always very high acid, and supposedly the kitty's digestive tract takes out that acid. Yippy, so now it's just as low acid as a common cup of arabica coffee that you can get at McDonalds. It's not that special now.

Save your money and get a cup of your favorite arabica low acid coffee like Sumatra or Celebese and skip the kitty poop-- you're being robbed.

[Helen of Annoy]

I like cats, I like coffee, but I don’t like the idea of cat digesting my coffee before I do.

It reminds me of truffles, they are expensive and stinky, so people buy them and endure the yucky aroma just to impress anyone willing to listen about their truffle dinner.

And speaking of body parts in food, stories about whole mouse baked inside of loaf of bread make me feel like barfing my stomach out, but I have no problem with insect legs and such, as long as they are processed in pieces small enough to be unnoticeable.

[MissMelsWell]

I like cats, I like coffee, but I don't like the idea of cat digesting my coffee before I do.

It reminds me of truffles, they are expensive and stinky, so people buy them and endure the yucky aroma just to impress anyone willing to listen about their truffle dinner.

And speaking of body parts in food, stories about whole mouse baked inside of loaf of bread make me feel like barfing my stomach out, but I have no problem with insect legs and such, as long as they are processed in pieces small enough to be unnoticeable.

LOL, actually, I like truffles... they're just a mushroom that grows underground. They're a little pungent, but Fois Gras woudn't be Fois Gras without those pungenty little bits of beautiful black truffle. Yummmmmmmm.

But then again, I'm a human garbage can, I'll eat just about anything except Ludefisk. No go on the jello fish that's been soaked in Lye. Nah-uh, no way, never again.

And just to be clear, Civet coffee is perfectly safe. No bacteria or anything bad would ever survive the roasting process. The problem with Civet coffee isn't that it was pooped by Felix, the problem is that Felix has no taste and feasts on crappy quality coffee beans.

Edited March 18, 2009 by MissMelsWell