Chitin and Your Mouth

I updated my photo on Big_Other.com

It's hard not to eat pieces of insect even if you're a vegan. It turns out that there are substantial quantities of said pieces in products such as peanut butter and chocolate. The FDA deems this contamination of “aesthetic” significance. There's a whole paper just in that designation isn't there? HT Jarrod Fowler.

Chitin also appears in mushrooms. Interesting non-boundary there between “animal” and non-animal. John Cage was a vegetarian who studied mushrooms, along with his day job as spearhead of the avant garde.

Carlos Casteneda was stopped by a horrified fan at a burger joint in New Mexico while he was chowing down on a hamburger. When asked to explain himself he replied, “Everything is sacred.” Think about it.

(It's also hard not to eat pieces of animal when you're committed to eating pieces of them deliberately. Wilde: “alcohol, when taken in sufficient quantities, produces all the effects of drunkenness.”)

I remain a vegan.

CHOCOLATE AND CHOCOLATE LIQUOR	Insect filth (AOAC 965.38)	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 (AOAC 965.38)	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
	Shell (AOAC 968.10-970.23)	For chocolate liquor, if the shell is in excess of 2% calculated on the basis of alkali-free nibs

DEFECT SOURCE: Insect fragments - post harvest and/or processing insect infestation, Rodent hair - post harvest and/or processing contamination with animal hair or excreta, Shell - processing contamination
SIGNIFICANCE: Aesthetic