Customer who ate maggots from croissant wants answers from bakery

HARLINGEN, Texas (ValleyCentral) — In this week's Food 4 Thought, the Food Patrol did a follow-up to a bakery with significant issues.

The Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office, attorneys, the health department, and the Food Patrol are all investigating a bakery after a customer reported eating maggots.

“I just threw everything. I started throwing up and went into panic thinking that I was gonna die, and all these things I was afraid of," the customer who found maggots in her croissant said.

The Food Patrol attempted to receive answers last Wednesday and headed to the bakery to show them their county's health inspection reports. However, they did not want to talk to the Food Patrol.

The customer is speaking out because she says this picture does not even begin to show the trauma and the bills she is now having to pay.

She asked the Food Patrol not to show her face, but she showed the video, the ambulance, and the hospital bills.

She even showed us the croissant that is sitting in a deep freezer.

Maggots were falling out of the ham and cheese croissant she paid for in cash on May 29. The customer did not save the croissant's receipt, but she does have the $1,700 ambulance receipt.

The Hidalgo County Sheriff’s incident report and the county health inspector's report state she was picked up by an ambulance at the bakery's parking lot and taken to a hospital.

She says biting into the maggots put her in the emergency room, and the hospital bill tops more than $14,000. The Food Patrol called billing and confirmed that she owes $2,627.45.

She does not believe any of the hospital, ambulance, or post-care bills should be her responsibility.

"Nobody has gotten in contact with me or anything. You mentioned that you tried to get in contact with them, and they didn't want anything. My lawyers as well. They said that they're just hanging up the phone on them, and they don't want to answer or talk to them at all," the customer said.

She says her family is traumatized and she cannot eat anything resembling maggots, including rice.

"Anything with rice or anything, because the croissant had ham and cheese, so I've been staying away from that because I'm like, 'oh, and it reminds me of it.' My husband's like, 'No, you're OK. It's not in it anymore.' But it still stays behind near the back of your head, you know?” she said.

What does the Reyna Bakery have to say?

Well, nothing, and this is the Food Patrol's second attempt at reaching them over the phone.

Before we sat down with the customer, the Food Patrol visited the bakery to hold them accountable because the maggot croissant is not the only issue.

On May 15, Hidalgo County health inspectors conducted two separate inspections two weeks before she ate the maggot croissant.

Inspectors found a combined 40 violations, including "flies and uncovered food."

It is a significant violation because flies can lay their eggs in uncovered food. Within eight to 20 hours, the eggs turn into maggots.

The Food Patrol showed up 42 days after the customer was taken by ambulance from their parking lot.

Their pastries, including croissants, are still uncovered, just feet away from the door.

Flies were buzzing around at one point because there was a dead one at the window.

Before we aired this report on July 23, the Food Patrol spoke with the customer’s husband and their attorney.

They did not want to be interviewed but reached out the next day to show us something.

Frozen in the customer's freezer is the bakery bag with the maggot-filled crosisant.

Frozen in time but fresh in her mind.

“I know that I won’t be visiting there again. I just want it to be fixed," the woman said.

And that’s Food 4 Thought!