Bad Shopping Habit - Opening Sealed Jars

The other day as I was doing my usual grocery shopping I came across a couple who were in the sauces section practicing a very dangerous shopping habit. In this section there were tomato purees and tomato based sauces for cooking pasta.

The middle-aged couple were opening jars of imported tomato based sauces and smelling each one. I presume they wanted to make sure the contents were fresh since they were not satisfied with opening just one jar. In case you are assuming it was an aunty (more on Please Don't Call Me Aunty) who was doing this, you are wrong.  The couple were obviously not Malaysians too.

The man was opening each jar, smelling it, showed it to his wife (I presume it was it was his wife) and after closing the jar , chose another one. Not satisfied with opening one jar he proceeded to open another 3 more jars. I did not stay to observe how many jar he opened or whether he bought any in the end.

Now, you may chide me for not pointing it out to them that it was not the right thing to do. At the time, the thought did cross my mind but I hesitated in pointing out his shameful act. In the end I failed to do my civic duty.

The couple should have known that all the jars there came from the same batch so each jar was no different from the rest in terms of freshness. If they wanted to know if the taste was acceptable to them then they could very well buy one jar and if it was not to their liking then they know which one not to buy the next time. No one in their right minds choose a sealed jar this way.

I am sure they did not think that their act was not just bad shopping practice but could also lead to a health risk for customers who bought the unsuspecting jars. The jars were vaccuum sealed to protect against contamination so once the seal was opened, the jar of contents were open to the thousands of bacteria floating around. What if shopper had bought that particular jar and did not use it right away. It could be some time again when it was subjected to more contamination so that when it was consumed the contents were already be a TICKING BOMB which could have disastrous consequences.

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