president's choice puff pastry

My overall rating

This was an absolute disappointment and unsafe to consume. The butter in my puff pastry was rancid. (I formerly worked as the food safety and quality assurance coordinator at a company that manufactures meat pies using puff pastry, so I can...   +

This was an absolute disappointment and unsafe to consume. The butter in my puff pastry was rancid.

(I formerly worked as the food safety and quality assurance coordinator at a company that manufactures meat pies using puff pastry, so I can confidently say that I know how to properly store and prepare puff pastry. This product had remained in a frozen state and safely stored for the entire time it was in my possession before I went to use it.)

As I was unrolling the pastry the smell was quite strong - off and unpleasant. Unfortunately, I was feeling quite determined to make turnovers, as I had turned my unbearably hot apartment into a sauna when I made a wonderful peach berry filling a couple of hours earlier (made even worse by preheating my oven to bake the pastries). I have experience using Pepperidge Farms, Markcrest, and 7 Days branded puff pastries - all of which contain a palm kernel oil solid instead of butter. So I pressed on, convincing myself that this must just be how raw butter puff pastry smells. I was finally forced to admit that something was wrong while the turnovers were baking and the usual delightful aroma of baked pastries never appeared. Instead my entire suite was filled with an eye-wateringly unbearable stench of rancid butter.

I am sadly unsurprised by this. It seems to be increasingly common for Loblaw's to sell a spoiled and unsafe product at a ridiculously inflated price. Just two weeks ago I had a similar experience with a package of their naan bread. If you have the ability to shop at any other grocery chain, I would highly recommend it. Something needs to change.

(In case you were wondering, I definitely still attempted to eat it. However, my overwhelming desire for a turnover was immediately extinguished as I spat out the ill-taken bite and wiped tears from my eyes.)    -