No good ever comes from baking, that’s my motto. Well, that and there’s always room for the second bottle of wine and diets always start tomorrow; It’s good to have a motto for all occasions, I find.
However, in a misguided attempt to be domesticated and motherly yesterday I thought I’d bake a cake whilst the children were at their grandmother’s house. I know, I don’t know what came over me either. I still can’t think about it without itching all over and reaching for the gin bottle. Because little did I know this was going to be no ordinary cake burning affair. This was going to be Revenge Of The Killer Insects. Shudder.
As I reached into the top cupboard and pulled down a bag of flour a dozen or so small black things fell out of the cupboard. I frowned. One of them got up and crawled across the worktop. I gasped and peered into the packet of flour. There were hundreds them. Disgusting, black creepy crawlies writhing around in the flour. I almost vomited on their vile little heads.
I managed to pull myself together, put my big girl pants on and did what any self respecting mother of two would do. I threw the bag of flour back into the cupboard, slammed it shut and did a little screamy dance in the kitchen flapping my hands around in fit of panic. Then I went straight to Google for the answers.
These wriggly, puke inducing little horrors* are weevils; small creatures that lay their eggs in flour and cereal and then hatch in your cupboard.
Lovely.
They are often found in flour, cookies, cake mix, breakfast cereals etc. Pretty much every person on the planet has at some point eaten a weevil, it’s eggs or dismembered body parts.
Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! That is NOT helpful! How do I get rid of the little fuckers?
To get rid of weevils throw away all infected food.
Okay, I could do that.
And then clear out all your cupboards and thoroughly clean them.
What, all of them? Isn’t that a little drastic.
It’s the only way to be sure.
Huh, we’ll see about that. I closed the page and opened another. And then another, and another until I struck gold.
Clean out the infested cupboard.
Ha. In your face Google.
Armed with rubber gloves and the bravery of 10 men I cleared out the infested cupboard, gingerly picking packets of baking products up and tossing them into a bin liner. After the cupboard had been scoured clean I threw away the rubber gloves, burnt the clothes I was wearing and doused myself in disinfectant before opening the gin bottle with shaking hands.
You see, no good EVER comes from baking.
*it may not have actually called them that.
About Heather
If you freeze your flour before putting in the cupboard then the weevil eggs can’t hatch. I know still gross but at least they won’t ever be a moving “little fucker”.
My sister-in-law once ate half a package of saltines from my dad’s camper while sitting at the camp fire before she saw the weevil….damn I wish I could have been there! The story alone makes me grin maliciously!!!!! mmwahhhahahahahaha
Freeze the flour? It sounds all well and good in theory but in all honesty I just don’t have that level of commitment to my baking ingredients.
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
Oh, that made my skin crawl. But I do appreciate that you searched until you found the least exhausting remedy for the problem. I would have done exactly the same thing.
Even in a crisis I make a point of doing the bare minimum of housework.
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
Unfortunately for me, this has happened to me. But said little weevils had grown and expanded into little flying moths. MUCH, MUCH, harder to get rid of. SOOO, a very long morning of emptying the entire PANTRY and throwing away ANYTHING suspicious, then completely cleaning all surfaces and replacing items deemed to be OK (In cans, sealed bags,etc.)
In the end, totally grossed out and needing to go grocery shopping! And maybe get an adult beverage.
Going in the “way back machine”: in 1990 (or so), I ate a reece’s peanut butter cup with worms in it. Duh! I didn’t see them until it was too late. I was at work at the time, but it was late afternoon and the co-worker who consumed the other one in the twin-pack with me left early to go to the closest bar and down tequila shots. We think we killed the worms!
OMG flying moths? I just threw up a little in my mouth.
I think the tequila downing was a very natural reaction to eating a worm.
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
You know in Empire Of The Sun they ate the weevils because they were an added source of protein. Yes, this was a WWII film set in a Japanese PoW camp but other than your circumstances are the same.
Twitter Name: pocketropolis
Hell, have you seen my house? The circumstances are much closer than you might think!
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
So sorry but laughed out loud reading this! Yuck, yuck, yuck! I think I would have taken the kids out for the day and instructed hubby to deal with it before we returned! :D
Twitter Name: clarekirkp
It was tempting, I have to admit.
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
I may have just moved house instead.
Twitter Name: vbincatalunya
You may be my hero
Twitter Name: notefromlapland
I’m just impressed you waited to drink the gin until after the clean-up.
In the olden days, people set the infested bags of flour, cereal, etc, out in the sun so the eggs would hatch, and the weevils would eventually dig their way to the surface, mature into mothy things, and fly away. Then they made pancakes and pretended they were good.
Twitter Name: Mamacita
I’ll take a pass on that cake you were going to make me for my birthday.
Twitter Name: coolwhipmom
lol oh god when I get weevils in the flour I just pick them out and use the flour – figuring heat will kill any of their entrails!!!
Twitter Name: emmakaufmann
I probably shouldn’t have read this right before going to make biscotti.. You know what? I think the biscotti can wait now!