Spud reveals a sharp secret

PEELING potatoes for his young family's Sunday roast, Sidley student David Daniels was shocked to find one of the spuds contained a needle-sharp piece of metal, similar to a large opened staple.

Mr Daniels, 22, of Preston Road, Sidley, said: “I was immediately concerned that one of us might have swallowed the metal had I not spotted it as I was preparing our meal.

“It was about an inch or so long, so could have been really dangerous, especially to the children.”

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He and his partner, Catherine Sharp, 21, have a son, Alfie, aged four, and a daughter, Kacie-Mae, one, and Mr Daniels said he was worried that other customers buying the Suffolk-grown King Edward potatoes might encounter similar problems.

He contacted Lidl’s store in Ninfield Road, Sidley, from which he had bought the 2.5 kilogramme pack of Oaklands-branded potatoes earlier the same day, to alert staff.

He said: “I wanted to make sure people knew in case metal might have got into other packs of potatoes.

“We use the Lidl store a lot because it offers good products at low prices, and it’s also close to our home.

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“I was just glad we hadn’t decided to bake the potatoes in their jackets rather than peeling them, as otherwise I might not have seen the metal until it was too late.”

But Catherine added: “The thought of what might have happened had my son swallowed this, for instance, is just too scary. I think we’ll be shopping elsewhere in future.”

Lidl is a German discount supermarket company with some 8,000 stores worldwide, of which more than 550 are in the UK.

Though invited to comment on Mr Daniels’ unpleasant discovery and being given several opportunities to do so, Lidl had made no formal response at the time of going to press.